I actually do not order from my computer (DH orders anything in our household). My Meta (Facebook) page does not include my actual address - that I know of (SHHH). Google? I don’t have a Google account. ??? I’ve tried very hard to be “incognito” on public pages - obviously not hard enough. 
You don’t need a Google account to be tracked. If you run a Google search that’s enough.
I just named the big 3 but there are literally hundreds of adtech, analytics, and data broker companies that engage in cross-site tracking, profiling and selling user data. Many are obscure players (like The Trade Desk, BlueKai, Lotame, LiveRamp, Criteo) that most people have never heard of.
It’s hard to pinpoint which combination of your activities linked your alias to your mailing address, but it’s absolutely possible.
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I think you’re saying your husband orders from his computer so how could they have tied your IP address to the home address entered on a different computer? However to the external world all the devices in your house use the same IP address. On your local network devices have different IP addresses but your router uses something called Network Address Translation (NAT). All externally sent packets use the one IP address given to the router by your Internet Service Provider but get an additional unique number from the router to tell them apart called a port.
If you want to avoid this you can use a VPN which does the NAT step again and sends packets out under their IP address instead of the one from your router. You’ll want a paid VPN because some of the free ones make money by selling customer data!
However matching up your external IP address is only one technique, there are so many others. Tracking pixels, cookies, etc. One page from CNBC talking about data brokers is What internet data brokers have on you — and how you can start to get it back
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I’ve been receiving more notices that I’m eligible for a class action refund. Usually, they are from one of the major credit bureaus. The most recent was from a local hospital.
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Received a text message from Cameron (the country) that I was entitled to my Amazon refund if I clicked the link (and likely also provided info). Of course, I reported as spam and deleted.
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Someone is leaving a very vague message with only a first name wanting me to return the call and acting like he knows me. Area code is from New Mexico. Not calling this person. If they wanted to tell me who they are and why they are calling, I might. Otherwise, nope.
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I thought my late night email from Microsoft was spam, saying someone tried signing into my account from Brazil on an Android. Nope, got a security alert email early this morning. So I tried logging in to my old Microsoft account from the computer and was blocked. Half an hour later, I successfully recovered the account, changed my password, and set up two step verification.
I once used the account to buy student Office software - six years ago. No activity since, other than having Windows.
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Just read about this problem—guess I will save my luggage tags & boarding passes & bring them home to dispose of!
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This is from our local online news:
GUILFORD, CT — A local UPS employee on Wednesday was given the Guilford Police Department Citizen Award for her efforts in thwarting a scam aimed at a resident, according to police.
Police Chief Christopher Massey, Deputy Chief Martina Jakober, and officer Scott Gingras, presented the award to Missy, who works at the UPS Store in Village Walk.
“A few weeks ago, Missy was working when a customer entered the store and was attempting to send a package. She believed the package might be related to a scam due to some common ‘red flags’ while the victim was in the store trying to ship it,” police said in an announcement. “The customer was on the phone the entire time and appeared to be taking instructions as to what to say to the store employee from someone on the line. The customer also appeared flustered and confused explaining the shipment information to Missy.”
Police said Missy asked pertinent questions about the package believing it was a scam, but the customer, who was being coached on the phone, lied to her about the package and its contents, police said.
“After the customer left the store, Missy called Guilford Police out of concern that the customer was indeed a victim of a scam. When the officer arrived on scene, the package was opened and it was discovered that the customer had been attempting to ship $10,000 in cash to the scammer on the phone, believing he was sending the money to Paypal after receiving a phishing scam email,” police said.
The email the victim received indicated there was an unusual charge to his PayPal account and to contact the company immediately, police noted.
The victim contacted the number in the scam email and the scammers were able to access the victim’s bank accounts, making it appear they deposited $45,000 into his account, according to police.
“The scammers then instructed the victim to send $10,000 back to correct the error. They convinced the victim that the employee at the store might be a scammer and to remain on the phone during the transaction for instructions. The victim was further instructed to tell Missy lies about the contents of the package,” police said.
The UPS transaction was cancelled shortly after it was made, and the money was returned to the customer who was educated on the warning signs of a scam, police said.
“We are grateful to Missy and commend her efforts in protecting a Guilford resident from suffering a significant financial loss,” police said.
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My husband got a text from a strange phone number allegedly from a recruiter. He was curious where the scammer was sending these texts from and looked up the country code. And here is what the AI said! 
Geez.
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More than 90% of the scam text messages I receive these days appear to come from Philippine telephone numbers. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean the scammers are actually based there.
Telecom rates in the Philippines are very low, making it an attractive place to send tens (or hundreds) of thousands of messages at minimal cost.
Scammers anywhere, including here in the U.S., can lease blocks of Philippine phone numbers, much like a traveler might buy a local SIM card.
Of course, some scammers are genuinely based in the Philippines. But if a text contains a lot of local information - such as details about your toll system or parking authority - it’s likely the sender is local.
Of course actual numbers can be spoofed. I thought it was funny that the AI quickly connected the area code with scams. Sad days for the Philippines.
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I’m assuming (?) that all of the customer service employees for many companies we deal with that are located in the Philippines are using safe/secure 800 numbers as they get transferred from our call here to overseas.
Yes they can be. But these scam texts are usually sent from real (not spoofed) Philippines numbers that are leased by scammers.
Ha ha! That’s true 
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Here’s the obligatory story about two factor authorization etc being problematic instead of helpful. An older volunteer in our organization (who lives far away) has asked me to be the backup for sending out emails “just in case” and we’re trying to find a workaround so that she doesn’t need to enter the code on her phone every single time I try to log into the account. I think we’re having a zoom call tomorrow … although she isn’t sure she can log into zoom …
Word is out that Workday got hacked. Just great…
Coinbase keeps sending my DH scam texts about a payment. So annoying
I was at the post office today and the woman ahead of me had to pay $9 to get a package she had ordered. The clerk told her that the shipping label was fake and that this has become a big issue for the post office. The woman said, “well, I won’t order from them again but the face lotion is suppose to be great.” I thought to myself that if they are scamming on the label, you might be a bit wary of the product. Anyhow, the clerk said to be careful where you are ordering items from. A worth repeating bit of wisdom.
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Argh, argh, argh. DH fell for the same scam that he did in the past. His Sawzall battery is not working. He tried to contact Dewalt and somehow ended up on the JustAnswer . com website. He got a message that it would cost $5 to talk to an expert, so he said OK and gave them his CC number.
Then I got a text from Capital One asking about the $65 charge from the company. When I looked at the website, it’s clear that $5 is the fee to “join,” and then there’s a $60/month charge. So deceptive.
I chatted with a bot and it said, sorry, that’s our policy, the charges are clearly stated on the website.
So we will dispute it with Capital One. We have a screen shot of the statement it would cost $5, along with a screen shot of their denial of the refund request.
It appears that a class action lawsuit has been filed against the company, no surprise.
We can’t dispute it until it’s no longer “pending.” I am going to make DH call. This happened once before and I TOLD him not to fall for it again. Ugh. I could have charged more than $65 to my client considering the time I’ve spent on this.
I was at the gym when this happened. If I’d been here, I probably would have been able to stop it. 
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Don’t know if it’s a scam exactly, but someone set up an eBay sellers account using my AOL email. Oddly the welcome email had son’s first name, although if someone found my email address on the web they certainly might be able to find other family members. I’ve changed my AOL password and tried changing the eBay password. It stopped me at a security screen that asked me to call to verify since it’s a different computer. Agent would not help me until I gave her the full name on the sellers account - which I couldn’t do, of course. So no way to get my email unaffiliated but it’s no use to the seller now.
And now I feel like joining the insomniacs thread.
Edit to add that there’s no way it was actually son because he absolutely would never had done this - paranoid about putting any personal info in the interwebs. And he’d never use my email.
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