I Am Whatever You Say I Am, If I Wasn’t, Why Would I Say I Am…? (Introducing The Fake Name Generator.)
Hi. I see you're new here. That's cool. To find out what this site is about, please read this page. You may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. It's free, you won't receive any spam from me (like, ever), but more importantly: you'll never miss a single word. Thanks for visiting!
Mark O’Neill at Geeks Are Sexy wrote about this earlier and you should head over to his post for more detail.
Then check out the Fake Name Generator. Or FNG, as I’m going to insist on calling it from now on.
If you’re one of those people who’s a bit wary about the risk of identity fraud, or you’re just sick and tired of endlessly entering your personal details into websites you’ll never visit again in order to get things - articles, software, etc - just call up the FNG and before you can say “Lord Lucan”, it’ll rustle up a brand-new (and convincing) identity for you. Enter that into the website, and away you go.
Want an example? Okay. The site lets you set things like your gender, your country, and your ‘name set’ (which is where your name comes from; i.e., you could be an American living in Germany, say). It can be anything you want - you don’t have to make it like you. I mean, that’s as bit pointless, given that you’re trying to avoid entering your actual details.
I’m a mostly-Irish man living in England. Let’s say I want to be a Swedish woman living in Iceland (and let’s face it, who doesn’t?). I enter those variables into the system, hit ‘go’, and this is now who I am:
Gina Martinsson
Klapparstígur 83
127 Reykjavík
Pretty cool, huh? But that’s just the beginning. The FNG site also gives you a usable email address, as many of these websites require you to prove you’re who you say you are before they allow you anywhere near the good stuff. It’s temporary, but will be active long enough for you to authorise your login and grab those goodies.
You want more? You get a fake phone number too (473 6057), mother’s maiden name (Fransson), date of birth (June 1, 1961), and even a Visa number, with expiry date. Why the credit card? Because some sites want that, even when the thing is meant to be free. Ooookay.
It’s all good. The Fake Name Generator has the potential to be huge.
Now you’ll have to excuse me; I’m off to give Gina a call. What? She’s Swedish!