Privacy question (Ancestry)

[Blaeberry]

Hi
I have my ancestry tree set to Private. I wonder what to do when a private request for information on an individual is asked? If I let the person in to view my tree am I correct in thinking living people will be marked private if I only invite as a guest?
Thanks

[Caroline]

I believe so and this seems to agree:

https://support.ancestry.co.uk/s/article/ka215000000TzHdAAK/Managing-your-Ancestry-Tree-1460088949689

• Check or uncheck Can see living people to adjust the ability of invitees to view living individuals.

(I assume that this page is up to date, not all their support pages are since the changes.)

[Blaeberry]

Hi Caroline
Thanks very much. That makes me a bit happier now.

[angelina]

I dont let anyone see my tree at all as i once answered a pm question about ancient ancestor - ie who was his wife and days later saw he had the whole side of that family on his public tree. OK he had done the research as anyone can but it made it very obvious who my grandparents were and therefore who my father was. I rooted thru his tree and never saw any connection to my family at all. so all i can say it be very careful who you let see your tree and what you answer by pm.

[Blaeberry]

Thanks Angelina
That puts a different slant on it. I was a bit worried but thought I was being paranoid. Maybe I'll remove my tree from being searchable.
Thanks, its good to hear different opinions. I'll have to have a think now.

[Olde Crone Holden]

I don't let anyone see my tree either. I prefer to drip feed information once I have established a connection and also to find out how rigorous their research has been. There are already more than enough rubbish trees out there for anyone to copy and I don't have the slightest interest in adding to them!

OC

[Blaeberry]

Thanks OC. Yes I think that is what I will do. I like the idea of sharing but I wasn't so happy about my whole tree (except living people) being visible. Thanks for input.

[Janet in Yorkshire]

Thanks OC. Yes I think that is what I will do. I like the idea of sharing but I wasn't so happy about my whole tree (except living people) being visible. Thanks for input.

Most of us are happy to share, but unfortunately there are some people who have a different interpretation of "give and take" -i.e "You give and I'll take." :(
Has the person making the request got an online tree which they've been happy for you to view?

Jay

[Guy]

Share your tree you will gain far more in the long term by sharing than by hiding it away in case anyone copies it.

You will hear 101 different excuses for not revealing a tree but none are in my view valid reasons.
There is no reason why a researcher has to confine themselves of their own family.
Some research a surname, some research families from a village or location, some find something of interest and follow that up by researching the subjects family, all are valid reasons for research.

I will give you two of many reasons for my sharing.

The first stems from 2007 when I got a phone call from the police at 10 o'clock at night informing me that my brother had died. They found me through my family history website after a friend of my brother had mentioned he had a brother who was interested in family history and had created a website. (That was in spite of the fact that if the police had bothered to check his house phone they would have found me on the fast dial listing.
Frank had died on the 1^st of March, the police contacted me on the evening of the 13^th allowing me to travel overnight to Scotland call at the undertaker’s to collect the relevant paperwork and register his death on the 14^th.
Deaths have to be registered within eight days but due to Frank’s body not being discovered in his house for a week, I just managed to register his death within the allotted time period.

My second example is a far happier one and one that has occurred this year.
My mother in law had lost tough with her sister in the early 1970s when the sister moved abroad, we had tried to contact them a number of years ago to notify them about my mother-in-law’s death but due to privacy legislation in the country concerned this proved impossible.
However in the intervening years one of the grandchildren tried to make contact and discovered my website this was shared with others and eventually the whole family made contact and plans are in place for a reunion later this year.

To be quite frank it would not bother me if my tree had been copied a thousand times (I know it has been copied a number of time) that would not deter me from hosting it online.

The fact that it was useful in both the above cases more than makes up for that.

In addition I have been contacted by distant relatives thanking me for my research and offering information that they know of their lines.

Don’t be put off by others share what you know and enrich your life.

Cheers
Guy

[Sylvia C]

I'm like most of the others ............... I do not share my tree.

If someone contacts me, I first establish via emails that there really is a valid possibility that we really do share the ancestor.

Then I send only information from that branch to the other person ......... and I do not usually bring it down to the presnt-day.

I have the opposite experiences to Guy ............. bad ones.

Someone "lost" my father, had my brother "marry" my mother and become my father ...... despite the fact that he was quite obviously only 10 years old when I was born, and almost 30 years younger than my mother. He refused point-blank to respond to me, or to make changes ........ in fact he was removed from the One Name Study Group because he refused to respond to either myself OR the Registrar of the group.

Sad thing is that we really were connected quite closely!

[Olde Crone Holden]

Guy

I knew you would respond to this thread!

In neither of the circumstances you quote in your post did you have to share the whole of your tree toget the results you got. I have made many contacts even though my tree is private, it is name searchable. Almost every contact has been from a hopeful but hopeless researcher who has no connection to my tree - what on earth would I wnt to show them my whole tree for?

OC

[Sylvia C]

OC ...............

I'm like you ........... almost every contact from my tree on ancestry AND the tree I still have on GR has been hopeless .................. same name but birth year, place of birth, parents' names, etc all wrong.

.......... and ancestry does not help with those "leaf tips" .............. I've stopped checking mine as they were so wrong.

[Blaeberry]

Thanks for all the opinions and input.


Guy, I'm sorry for your loss of your brother and understand why you keep a public tree, its good to see the good that came in bring family back together.

Janet, the person who has asked for information on an individual does have a small (~43 people) public tree, but the person they are asking about or any name related to them (to the best of my knowledge) are not on the tree.

I feel that, for me, I may create public trees which do not include the present day family members and their families but other than that I feel I prefer a private tree.

Also, other family members may not be happy about information "going public".

I still new to this in the bigger context and it is interesting to get different options while I try to consolidate my own feelings on the matter of private vs public.
Thanks

[Olde Crone Holden]

Blueberry

I think it is basic good manners NOT to have any living people on your tree unless they have expressly given you their permission and realise what that involves.

My own trees start with my grandparents, all long since dead. When I first put a tree on the internet, I shared it with someone who sharedONE great great grandparent with me. I had put some personal comments about my parents marriage and I was dismayed and distressed when he copied my remarks to his public tree. He did eventually remove those remarks rather reluctantly and of course it was my own fault he ever saw them. Lesson learned!

I should add, lest it be thought that I am a mean-spirited researcher determined to keep my knowledge to myself, that I always point out where I think their research is wrong and why. I invite them to discuss why I might be wrong and they might be right. No one ever takes me up on my offer!

OC

[Guy]

Guy

I knew you would respond to this thread!

In neither of the circumstances you quote in your post did you have to share the whole of your tree toget the results you got. I have made many contacts even though my tree is private, it is name searchable. Almost every contact has been from a hopeful but hopeless researcher who has no connection to my tree - what on earth would I wnt to show them my whole tree for?

OC

That is true OC I would have got exactly the same results if I had only displayed the living people on my tree and perhaps the generation before them.

I could have hidden the earlier generations back to the 15th century as they were of no help in the case of the two examples I quoted.
However if I had done that then I would not have benefited from the contacts from people who have contacted me about my lineage in the 18th, 17th, 16th and 15th centuries and would have defeated the point of having an online tree.

Blueberry

I think it is basic good manners NOT to have any living people on your tree unless they have expressly given you their permission and realise what that involves.

I would also add I disagree with your view that it is basic good manners not to have living people on your tree. That is simply a modern idea stemming from the USA and is not in line with British genealogy over the centuries where the standard practice since the 15^th century has been to display living people on pedigrees.

It is also not the legal position in the UK where the Information Commissioner has already ruled that it is perfectly acceptable for an individual to display details of living people on their family history website.
Though I should also point out in other parts of the world that is not the case.

I'm like most of the others ............... I do not share my tree.

If someone contacts me, I first establish via emails that there really is a valid possibility that we really do share the ancestor.

Why! Do you think you own your ancestors and no one else has the right to research them?
In that case you must surely resent biographies the people write, or even histories that name people. I would suggest that is a very short-sighted attitude.

Then I send only information from that branch to the other person ......... and I do not usually bring it down to the presnt-day.

I have the opposite experiences to Guy ............. bad ones.

Someone "lost" my father, had my brother "marry" my mother and become my father ...... despite the fact that he was quite obviously only 10 years old when I was born, and almost 30 years younger than my mother. He refused point-blank to respond to me, or to make changes ........ in fact he was removed from the One Name Study Group because he refused to respond to either myself OR the Registrar of the group.

Sad thing is that we really were connected quite closely!

Why does that matter? Your tree would still show the correct facts and any incorrect facts could easily be checked, however due to you keeping your tree private the correct lineage is hidden from public view. I would suggest that is counter productive and simply promotes the error.

Cheers
Guy

[Olde Crone Holden]

Good manners a modern idea??? Good heavens, I always think good manners are old fashioned now!

20 years ago anyone would have had to make a huge physical effort to see anyone else's tree, even if they knew where to look for it. Before the internet I saw very few family trees and almost every one was a published one of long dead people. Nowadays we can all sit here in our jimjams and access every daft and unresearched tree in the universe.

Just because it is not against the law to put living people on our trees doesn't mean we can. If I found myself on someone's public tree I can tell you they would not get one shred of cooperation from me, which would be to their detriment because I have a LOT of properly researched information to share.

OC

[Sylvia C]

Guy ...............


I disagree with you, and I don't really like the comments you make ..............

the plain brutal fact is that the person made a CD of the family tree, based on his One Name Study, and then circulated it to ca 100 people who turned up to a meeting he organised. That CD has the wrong information on it, and has been re-circulated heaven knows how many times.

It will never be corrected among an unknown number of people, no matter whether my tree is public or not ..............

let's agree to disagree on this.

You have your ideas, I have mine

[Anne in Carlisle]

I tend to agree with Guy! As I have mentioned before I am in the process of getting my trees onto Ancestry so that I can make them public and they will be there when I am long gone. I include certificates and explanations for my findings and hope people will make use of them. Yes, they are my ancestors but they are also many other peoples' ancestors. So what if people 'add them to the wrong tree'? My information is as good as I can make it and anyone in the future with half a brain should be able to sort out a well sourced tree from one with no sources.

As I work through each person (yes this is a very long term piece of work!) i can see the rubbish that is on some other trees with no sources and also some other well sourced trees which give me ideas for my own work. I never 'copy' those but work through it for myself. Without some of those views from different angles, though, I may well have missed some clues.

I know Guy has his own website and I did consider doing this. However the learning curve would have been difficult for me and also I guess a website would die with me. When I have finished my Ancestry additions I will start on other hosting sites such as Tribal Pages.
Anne

[Vacumatic]

Must admit that it is a concern.

Especially when a common security question is mothers maiden name. (by the way I was surprised when I asked the question at work to six people, not one of them knew their mothers maiden name)

[Guy]

Good manners a modern idea??? Good heavens, I always think good manners are old fashioned now!

20 years ago anyone would have had to make a huge physical effort to see anyone else's tree, even if they knew where to look for it. Before the internet I saw very few family trees and almost every one was a published one of long dead people. Nowadays we can all sit here in our jimjams and access every daft and unresearched tree in the universe.

Just because it is not against the law to put living people on our trees doesn't mean we can. If I found myself on someone's public tree I can tell you they would not get one shred of cooperation from me, which would be to their detriment because I have a LOT of properly researched information to share.

OC

Twisting what I said OC, the idea that the publishing the names of living people is bad manners is a modern idea.

Throughout time it has been acceptable to publish biographies of living people, publish family trees or pedigrees of living people it is just in the last twenty or so years that paranoia about privacy has changed that view.

I take it you have never viewed a Heralds Visitation which when they were pubished contained the names of living people, or perhaps you have never read a biography of a living person.
Have you not seen published births and marriages in newspapers or even published exam results such as A levels and O levels etc., in local papers?
If not then you must have led a very sheltered life.

If the truth be know by promoting the concept that details about living people are private lulls the naive into a false sense of security and encourages them to use such things as their mother’s maiden name as a form of security password.

It has been known since the early 1970s that use of such things not only offers no protection but actually makes it easier for the criminal to open banks accounts easily.
There are programs available that will run words through security to find the correct password to open the file.
That is why we are encourage not to use names or real words in passwords but use random letter and numbers etc. instead.

Cheers
Guy