Tell HN: AngelList told my employer that I'd updated my profile • Hacker News Board

Re: Tell HN: AngelList told my employer that I'd updated my profile

#61

Post by OoTheNigerian » Mon, Mar 21, 2016, 10:26 AM UTC

Hytosys wrote: post #55

OoTheNigerian wrote: post #42

HN users confuse me quite a bit. How would they confirm if you are lying or Telling the truth? I believe the only wah would be to confirm from the organization owner. Or else, ANYONE can claim to have done any project. I believe they do the same verification (it's simple verification) for roles in an organization.e.g Adviser, Co founder, Investor etc. And the verification is the other way too. If an employer adds you…

Employers are necessarily oppressive and may fire employees over this sort of notification if the listed project or the AngelList profile in general is against business interests. If it wasn't clear already, this sort of move shows exactly who AngelList is serving. After all, as you said, how will the employer, in their contractual fantasies, ever be able to confirm that a potential interviewee is telling the truth ?

I don't work for AngelList however I think this is overblown.

If you add yourself to an open site, your employer will see it. It is indexed on Google. It shows up when you search the site for the organization.

Are you saying as an owner of an organization, you are happy for anyone to claim to be an employee and to have done any project at your company without you knowing?

Should I be able to claim I did the Dropbox AWS migration without the folks at Dropbox getting notified I am making the claim?

It would be bizarre for an employer to fire an employee for stating (s)he works at the company and did a project.

But what do I know.

Re: Tell HN: AngelList told my employer that I'd updated my profile

#62

Post by imazio » Mon, Mar 21, 2016, 10:38 AM UTC

bachback wrote: post #50

AngelList lists startups, so why are you registering there if you are employed? That's likely a violation of your contract in the first place, and their ToS, and it's public info anyway. AngelList is for companies, not projects. You do realise this info is meant to be public? AngelList is a public register of startups showing the people behind them. If you don't want that info public, don't register there.

There is also a "JOBS" section. If they are not protecting the confidentiality of the potential candidates, well, they are not making any favour to the startups or their business.

Re: Tell HN: AngelList told my employer that I'd updated my profile

#63

Post by lgomezma » Mon, Mar 21, 2016, 10:42 AM UTC

Just deleted my account, this is unacceptable.

Re: Tell HN: AngelList told my employer that I'd updated my profile

#64

Post by uniclaude » Mon, Mar 21, 2016, 10:44 AM UTC

OoTheNigerian wrote: post #57

gedrap wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think, when people usually update their profile on angellist, linkedin, etc? Usually, when looking for a new job. And normally, you'd rather not share the fact that you're looking for something with your current company as they might start looking for your replacement before you're ready. >>> Perhaps they should have told you they were going to verify your project? That would a huge difference and that's why the frus…

It's a semi prison if you are not allowed to update your profile at a job you work. Remember, the person in question had to chose they were in the said organization and did a certain project. Anyway, asking Angelist to show any claim will be confirmed is not asking for too much. However, it is not such a scandal as OP makes it out to be.

> It's a semi prison if you are not allowed to update your profile at a job you work.

It's not disallowed, it's just not good. You might not pay attention when your employees are looking for other jobs, but most business owners do, and react rather negatively to it.

> it is not such a scandal as OP makes it out to be

OP posted a one-line "Tell HN" comment, you're actually the one calling it a scandal.

Re: Tell HN: AngelList told my employer that I'd updated my profile

#65

Post by solve » Mon, Mar 21, 2016, 10:48 AM UTC

Edit: Oh cool, Hackernews still has this account rank-banned so the comments always stay at the bottom of the page no matter how many upvotes they get.

So happy that I'm not the only one who was extremely surprised and upset about Angel List's impersonation tactics.

In my experience, 100% of the people who received this impersonation email that angel.co sent, thought it was written by me. If the system wants to send a message on my behalf, it must AT LEAST show me what would be sent with my signature on it, and allow me to confirm or cancel any email that's signed with my full name before it's sent. Angel List is sending out emails with your signature and other impersonation tricks, totally behind your back.

I've had people impersonate emails from me in the past as well. Even if the emails aren't offensive, just the idea that someone else now thinks they have my permission to send whatever they want to, while impersonating me behind my back makes me feel extremely uneasy.

Here's the impersonation email they send to cofounders when they're added to a profile. As you can see, signing the email with the user's full name, as if the user had written the letter, is a clear impersonation that the user never consents to.

    FROM:  

    Hi ,

    I'm building an AngelList profile for  and need your help.

    Can you do me a favor and confirm that you're a founder by clicking here:

    https://angel.co/l/54223434234234583948593475

    This is important to us; confirming that you're a founder will help us build our profile.

    Thanks,
    

    P.S. If you would like to visit our profile first, go here: https://angel.co/

Email headers used:

    From:  
    Reply-To:

Re: Tell HN: AngelList told my employer that I'd updated my profile

#66

Post by dwightgunning » Mon, Mar 21, 2016, 10:53 AM UTC

dwightgunning wrote: post #33

When you say "pretending to be me" do you mean that they spoofed your email address in the from and/or reply-to fields? [edit: typo]

Downvotes? Just looking for some clarification on what actually happened here. It's not exactly clear.

Re: Tell HN: AngelList told my employer that I'd updated my profile

#67

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Mar 21, 2016, 10:55 AM UTC

OJFord wrote: post #58

robzyb wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is, of course, perfectly legal to do that with permission. The problem here is that it was done without permission. The OP is claiming that the impersonation without permission is a crime, and that it is impossible to waive the crime-ness of it through a contract.

Parent is replying to a comment stating: > If an offence is criminal it can't be magically made OK > by a contract. I think this must be mistaken (IANAL either). Boxing, assisted suicide, and voting by proxy come to mind.

[deleted]

Re: Tell HN: AngelList told my employer that I'd updated my profile

#68

Post by OoTheNigerian » Mon, Mar 21, 2016, 11:02 AM UTC

uniclaude wrote: post #64

OoTheNigerian wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a semi prison if you are not allowed to update your profile at a job you work. Remember, the person in question had to chose they were in the said organization and did a certain project. Anyway, asking Angelist to show any claim will be confirmed is not asking for too much. However, it is not such a scandal as OP makes it out to be.

> It's a semi prison if you are not allowed to update your profile at a job you work. It's not disallowed, it's just not good. You might not pay attention when your employees are looking for other jobs, but most business owners do, and react rather negatively to it. > it is not such a scandal as OP makes it out to be OP posted a one-line "Tell HN" comment, you're actually the one calling it a scandal.

Well, to each organization his to his or her own.

You are right re: the second part. I projected the "WHAT A SCANDAL??!!" comment thread to the OP.

As an aside though. Is there something wring for an employer to know ahead of time if their employee is planning to leave? Of course if an employee updating their profile gets you panicked, then you are not doing something right.

So I am speaking of non paranoid situations.

Re: Tell HN: AngelList told my employer that I'd updated my profile

#69

Post by solve » Mon, Mar 21, 2016, 11:06 AM UTC

dwightgunning wrote: post #33

When you say "pretending to be me" do you mean that they spoofed your email address in the from and/or reply-to fields? [edit: typo]

Yes, the FROM spoofs your name so that the person will believe it's being sent directly from you in most email clients, and the Reply-to goes directly to your email. These are the email headers:

    From: YOUR_NAME 
    
    Reply-To: YOUR_NAME

Re: Tell HN: AngelList told my employer that I'd updated my profile

#70

Post by jonesb6 » Mon, Mar 21, 2016, 11:08 AM UTC

dwightgunning wrote: post #66

dwightgunning wrote: post #33

When you say "pretending to be me" do you mean that they spoofed your email address in the from and/or reply-to fields? [edit: typo]

Downvotes? Just looking for some clarification on what actually happened here. It's not exactly clear.

People probably read too much into your comment, hence the down votes. Reason would dictate from the very small amount of info provided that AngelList merely made the email out to look like it was from OP. To say they spoofed them email headers would've gotten 3x the number of up-votes.