The leak of information that came from Ashley Madison has resulted in some real world consequences for many. In Toronto,
police are investigating suicides that are thought to be associated with the leak. Alternet discussed another element of the story: that men & women who "sought affairs" with a same sex partner may face life or death consequences:
http://www.alternet.org/...
As it turns out, no. The Ashley Madison leaks, as many observers began noting yesterday afternoon, could have real-world, devastating consequences on thousands of users worldwide. When the dust clears, it will be the most vulnerable — LGBT people and women in repressive countries — who will ultimately pay the price, not in snarky Internet comments but through loss of employment, family and in some cases, possibly their lives.
In an article posted on Reddit, an Ashley Madison user pointed out concerns over his life:
https://www.reddit.com/...
I am from a country where homosexuality carries the death penalty. I studied in America the last several years and used Ashley Madison during that time. (For those of you who haven't been following the story, Ashley Madison has been hacked and its users' names and addresses are on the verge of being exposed.) I was single, but used it because I am gay; gay sex is punishable by death in my home country so I wanted to keep my hookups extremely discreet. I only used AM to hook up with single guys.
Most of you are Westerners in countries that are relatively liberal on LGBT issues. For those of you who are older--try to think back to a time 10 or 20 years again when homosexuality was intensely stigmatized. Multiply that horrible feeling of stigma by a million, and add the threat of beheading/stoning. That's why I used AM to have discreet encounters.
I BEG you all to spread this message. Perhaps the hackers will take notice of it, and then, I can tell them to (at the very least) exercise discretion in their information dump (i.e. leave the single gay arab guy out of it). As of now, I plan on leaving the Kingdom and never returning once I have the $ for a plane ticket. Though I have no place to go, no real friends, and no job.
UPDATE: I have gotten enough money to get car to Riyadh and a plane ticket to the US. I got a PM from a redditor who is in the Kingdom and a paralegal at a a major US law firm with an office in Riyadh (I will be traveling there this weekend). The firm's has a big pro bono practice that specializes in refugees! And it is very pro LGBT; tor he redditis going to arrange for me to meet with an associate to explain my association. It appears I'm in good hands. I will let you all know more soon! It looks like I'll be out of here in a few days with a concrete plan of action.
UPDATE: A bunch of people are accusing me of lying because 'AM is only for married people.' AM is actually about "discreet hookups," and hence its main appeal is to married people, since premarital sex isn't stigmatized in the West. But it also appeals to gays from regressive cultures, and their website has an option specifically for gays, as you can figure out if you do 5 minutes of research.
The idiots who claim I'm lying are projecting from personal experience, and forgetting that, for many gay people around the world, being outed is a life-threatening experience. The risks for us are greater than the risks for married Westerners cheating on their spouses. That's why AM's promise of discretion appeals to us. (Seriously, you think that there are no gay Muslims on there out of 37 million users?) In any case, that people would accuse me of being a liar on the basis of no evidence--at a time when I stand a serious chance of being tortured, murdered, or exiled--makes me pessimistic about humanity.
What is often worse, however, is that Ashely Madison was conducting an obvious scam. Thanks to numerous websites that have searchable access to all values from the Ashley Madison dump, I can see that tens of thousands of messages from 'female' members are just one sentence:
"Use me & abuse me!"
Leading me to believe that the fact the phrase is identical and repeated so frequently tells me that the vast majority of the female accounts on Ashley Madison were nothing but fakes.
Some messages struck me as authentic.. "Just wants someone to talk to" "Husband ill. Lonely" from a woman who's birthdate would put her in the 60+ category. Others were creepy 'If you want to meet a rapist, abuser, physopath then I am your m' (I assume they meant man the message cuts off) or "Orgasm Guaranteed!"
It is cute to poke fun at people like The Duggars who were caught in Ashley Madison's web... but we have to remember millions of people will be legitimately compromised. And while we may have some moral objections, none of them are doing anything illegal in the US or Canada.
Ashley Madison engaged in a large scale fraud. They promised users anonymity and security and they failed. They also apparently sold a fictitious product full of fake profiles designed to encourage people to keep paying them money.
The compromise of Ashley Madison has left porn-promoting websites in a state of panic as they look to secure their data, before exposing anyone who subscribed to, or paid for, sexualized content on the web. Following the attack of AdultFriendFinder in April, others wonder if several other dating services could be at risk (Tinder, Grndr, OK Cupid, or more risque sites oriented toward specific fetishes or live camming).
For men who use these sites there will be some shame that quickly goes away "I was stupid".. for women who are found to be using these sites, some from messages indicating they were fleeing bad relationships, the reality may be far more risky. For LGBT members, who are seeking a same sex relationship outside of their marriage their unceremonious outing by the online company risks their marriage, their employment and in some places in the world their lives.