Privacy

[tiredoftherain]

Title
Privacy

Short, concise description of the idea
Not able to set the default privacy to "Registered Users"

Full description of the ideaAt the moment it's not possible to set the default privacy of an account to "Registered Users

Comments

[silverflight8]

This has been brought up many times before, and iirc the main objection is that it provides a false sense of security. Anyone can sign up for an account - multiple accounts, which makes the "security" ineffective and more than that, deceivingly so.

[siderea]

Except it's not "security through obscurity". It's not security at all. It's a deterrent.

Extensive experiments online and F2F show that one of the best ways to radically decrease -- not eliminate, but deter -- social transgressions is to add very minor roadbumps.

There are two fundamental modes of griefing online. One is the targeted attack, where the attacker has identified a particular victim of choice and will go to great lengths to pursue them; stalkers are in this category. That's clearly what you are thinking of. However, that is the minority case. And important one, to be sure, but not the commonest sort of griefing

[fiddlingfrog]

Security through obscurity is never going to fly as a suggestion here on LJ.

However, if you have a paid account you can set up a personal version of this for your own journal - http://fiddlingfrog.livejournal.com/207523.html

[siderea]

Except it's not security through obscurity. Please see above.

[scolaro]

I like this suggestion, but not for the reasons you mentioned (see false security comments above).
There is already the option to restrict access to Scrapbook images to Registered Users, so to me it would make sense to have the same setting for entries as well, simply for consistency.

However, since this suggestion was again entered with focus on security I do understand why LiveJournal chose not to implement the option for entries in the first place.

[lied_ohne_worte]

It's quite possible that the people who commented on your entries did in fact have accounts, but chose to comment anonymously in order to be able to offend without repercussion. Even if your suggestion was implemented, they could still read your entries, and either comment with their primary account or create another for the purpose of commenting.

If your main worry are abusive anonymous comments, disabling anonymous comments would take care of them. Then you could ban, and if applicable, report registered commenters.

If the main worry is limiting who sees your entries, then only using the Friends-only setting gives you real control. As others said, security through obscurity doesn't really word.

ETA: Particularly as you say that you know the people in question and they know your account, I doubt that your suggestion would deter them - they would probably find out quickly how to read your entries even if they were "restricted" in the way you suggest.

[siderea]

I doubt that your suggestion would deter them

Actually, there's at least even odds it would accomplish exactly that. Please see above.

Furthermore, by not having posts visible to not-logged-in-users, the assailants wouldn't be able to use RSS to track the OP's activity or casually see if the OP'd put up a new post by visiting her page, both of which may be triggers for their attention. By simply not being casually visible, it's highly plausible the OP may attract their negative attention less.

Maybe they would turn out to be persistent. Or maybe they're just doing it because LJ makes it so damn easy to be a griefer and they're bored.

Nobody thinks window shades are "security", but we all have them for privacy. My employer requires they be drawn shut at the end of the day, so nobody walking by at 3am looks in and thinks, "Hey, check out that unattended, resellable computer on that desk!" We have actual security, of course -- locks and motion-sensing alarms -- but we also know those are far less effective than not coming to a