I've noticed Google visits a BBC blog where I'm a regular at least once an hour. So taking that as a benchmark, it's probably safe to say that anything published online for at least one hour may not be able to be permanently deleted. In the case of personal websites (NOT social networking profiles - proper websites), you may be able to get away with up to a day or so (i.e. if it's rarely visited, so search engines won't find it in a hurry), but after that the information is likely to exist on your hosting provider's backup tapes long after you've deleted it.

There's one simple rule to follow: if you wouldn't be happy for the information to be displayed on a billboard in your town centre, don't publish it :)

>Twitterers who got duped into revealing their "porn star name," etc.

Any scammer/spammer/hacker who can guess anything from my 'porn star name' is a bloody genius !

So guys say hello to Noddy Hill, not used for a username or password ANYWHERE.

Not much of a porn name either really :(

Is that old chestnut still doing the rounds then? I'm amazed how many people don't see what's wrong with that ruse....

That's another good reason to opt your websites out of the search engine cache. This website explains how you can do that, and links to some discussions about why you might want to:

http://noarchive.net/

Seems they may have been kicked off the twitter API - as that is all I get when I try and search for a name.

Anyone interested in their micro blog or whatever Twitter is actually supposed to be is obviously planning something devious. These Twits are letting us down. Setting the precedent that telling the world + dog what you're doing all the time is not only acceptable but desirable too.

So some smug MP can say it's okay to spy on us because we don't want privacy anyway. Just as long as he and his children can opt out of the big spy database, of course. Bah.

Perhaps not from your porn star name since you've only given us half your street name and, being a Reg reader, you're unlikely to have used "Name of my first pet" as a security question for your bank website -- other's aren't so clued up.

Oddly I didn't know that the "porn star name" and others were well known fishing scams -- I thought I worked it out for myself.

Name Address and DOB give someone full access to your bank account? better start warning people who put up "Happy Birthday John" type signs in their windows!