If you’ve filled out an online registration form you’ve probably noticed the latest security idea - challenge questions. These questions are used if you forget your password to make sure you’re you, but they are also a prime way for hackers* to infiltrate your account. It occurred to me that a reasonably skilled genealogist could answer these questions too.

The questions for one of the sites were.

1. What city were you born in?
2. What is your mother’s maiden name?
3. What is your father’s middle name?
4. What was the name of your elementary school?
5. What is your mother’s date of birth?
6. What is your father’s date of birth?
7. What is the date of your wedding anniversary?

If you hired a genealogist gone bad, they could probably answer all of those questions. Sheesh. We better hope ancestry.com doesn’t turn to the dark side.

* I know, I know, hackers in this sense are really crackers, but if I changed the title to crackers, then people would think of saltines and ritz instead of demonic genealogists. Besides, most of the world uses hackers instead of crackers anyway. It seems to be a losing battle.