Is Shell LiveWIRE promoting a reverse phone search?

[uksbd]

I see in the members search facility that Shell LiveWIRE has a facility where you can search for members by telephone number.

I also note these pages are optimised to appear in google so are effectively providing a reverse phone search system.
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en...f&aqi=&aql=&oq=

search for any of the phone number in that list and you get the member and link to a full profile.
Is this legal? and do members know about this?

[openmind]

I wouldn't have said illegal but certainly unethical. Fair play if it's a business land line already in the public domain but a mobile number?

[LiveWIRE_Mark]

Members should be aware that any details they place in their profile will become public information, it is up to you, as the member, how much information you wish to put in to your social network profile. As mentioned the profile pages are well indexed by Google so are a great way of getting your business information out in to the public domain.

Should you wish to change/delete the information that is in your profile then you can do so by clicking on http://www.shell-livewire.org/networ...ditprofile.php

[openmind]

Fair enough but at the very least there should be some kind of privacy settings in the profile aka facebook style that prevent certain parts of the profile being indexed...

[AlexanderSmith]

In fairness I think it would be fairly pointless to have privacy settings here. If you dont want your phone number being available dont put it up. 9 / 10 people will have their phone numbers available here so that people can contact them. If you want it place it, if you dont, just withhold that piece of information.

Thats my thoughts anyways.

[uksbd]

Originally Posted by Project1Group

In fairness I think it would be fairly pointless to have privacy settings here. If you dont want your phone number being available dont put it up. 9 / 10 people will have their phone numbers available here so that people can contact them. If you want it place it, if you dont, just withhold that piece of information.

Thats my thoughts anyways.

My post isn't about letting the phone number being made available or not, it is about the fact that shell LiveWIRE actually provide a reverse phone search facility.
I thought this was illegal in the UK?

[uksbd]

Originally Posted by Project1Group

In fairness I think it would be fairly pointless to have privacy settings here. If you dont want your phone number being available dont put it up. 9 / 10 people will have their phone numbers available here so that people can contact them. If you want it place it, if you dont, just withhold that piece of information.

Thats my thoughts anyways.

My post wasn't really about the fact they display the phone number or not, it was about the fact Shell LiveWIRE provide a reverse phone search facility.

I thought this was illegal in the UK?
Or does the fact it is a members list or a business site mean this isn't the case?

[lordlancaster]

As Mark says, the only information that appears on your Social Network profile is the information you manually add after registration so if you don't want it visible, don't put it on there.

The whole point of the Social Network is to help people market and promote their business online. So, if you want people to contact you by phone, put it on. If you don't, leave it off. Same goes for your email address.

You can alter your Privacy Settings very easily but I recommend leaving them as they are and then adding the following to your Social Network profile as a bare minimum:

1. Brief description of you or your business
2. A logo or photo
3. Your web address
4. Keywords (to help with internal search)

[uksbd]

I'm not bothered whether my information shows or not, I'm just interested to know if it is legal or not?

If it is, I am amazed that the likes of Yell are not providing a reverse phone lookup service the same as Shell LiveWIRE are doing.

Do you know whether it is legal or not?

[uksbd]

I've just tried a search on yell by adding a telephone number in the "I'm looking for" box and it does return results, it could not really be decribed as a reverse search facility, but they obviously have the capability to do so if they wanted to.

[gear7.co.uk]

There are a number of sites called things like 'who called me?' which provide information as to the owner/user of a phone number - most are targetted at nusiance calls from marketing companies. So it's not without precedent.

Personally, I think there are bigger issues in this world than whether it's technically legal to allow lookup of a phone number which is most likely widely publicised anyway....

Chris

[LondonBells]

Have to agree with Gear7. If you don't want information to be public - don't put it into your openly available settings. It's not hard to delete a particular piece of information

Its seems very funny that there is a complaint/debate about information users have input into a PUBLIC forum as they are appearing on Google - As many on here have said if you don't want to your details public dont put it on a forum!!!

It is even funnier that people are complaining about their business number being found on Google - Thats a good thing and something many companies pay SEO experts for

[uksbd]

Originally Posted by KoOSK

Its seems very funny that there is a complaint/debate about information users have input into a PUBLIC forum as they are appearing on Google - As many on here have said if you don't want to your details public dont put it on a forum!!!

It is even funnier that people are complaining about their business number being found on Google - Thats a good thing and something many companies pay SEO experts for

Complaint?
You obviously don't understand the main point of my question.

I was asking whether a reverse phone search feature like Shell LiveWIRE has here is legal or not?

I wasn't asking as a complaint, I was asking because I was planning on providing a reverse phone search facility in my directory but want to know whether it is legal or not before I set it up.

I'm pretty sure it isn't legal, but wondered if the fact that members are made aware of it makes any difference (assuming members are aware of it)

[lordlancaster]

I was asking because I was planning on providing a reverse phone search facility in my directory but want to know whether it is legal or not before I set it up.

I'm pretty sure it isn't legal

I'm confused. If you don't think it's legal, why are you thinking of doing it on your site?