What's on the internet? Do you know what others can learn about you?

There's more to protecting your privacy online than turning off your Spokeo profile

A company called Spokeo has been freaking out a lot of people lately: the site is sharing information thought to be private. Spokeo creates profiles that contain where you live, how much money Spokeo thinks you make, if you're married, hobbies, what names you use online. But Spokeo is just the tip of the iceberg.

There's a profile up there for you right now on Spokeo, probably, unless you're like a lot of people and you've taken it down. Facebook feeds everywhere have been filled with people sharing information on how to opt out of being listed on Spokeo.

Ryan Calo is with The Stanford Center for Internet and Society. He says Spokeo grabs this stuff off the web by scraping all sorts of information that's out there about everyone. Things like real estate transactions, telephone listings, social media, online photo albums, census data. It's not illegal, but rarely do you see all that data gathered together. It can be unnerving to see it all in one place, especially with a map overlay.

(More here. Important note: There are several sites on the Net that aggregate public info, so let's not blame Spokeo exclusively.)