Ordinarily, I'm hardly what you'd call a nosy neighbor—each to his own is my credo. Yet, w

ithout moving from my desk, I've learned what my neighbors paid for their houses, whether they*ye refinanced, how many bathrooms they have, and what their median income is. I know their birth dates, social security numbers, and driving records. And with a bit more digging I could unearth many of their legal and business dealing.

Do you find this unsettling？ You might. But consider this: None of this information is considered private. All of it, and much more, is available online to anyone with a computer and a modem.

What does the online world know about you？ Plenty—whether you're online or not. Using a pseudonym (handsome@service.com) won't help, either. That's because most of the information about you isn't coming from you, at least not directly. It's coming from myriad government records and business transactions, which are being digitized, linked, packaged, sold, and re-sold. All of this is legal, or at least it is not clearly illegal.

In one sense, the availability of "public records" online is merely an electronic extension of how things have always worked. With a few dollars and a trip to the right city, county, or state agency, you can get copies of many publicly filed records, such as real estate transactions or birth certificates. But a funny thing happened on the way to city hall in the 1990s. Actually, it's a confluence of four factors: PCs are everywhere, the Internet is connecting millions of them, business and government records are now routinely stored on computers, and government agencies (especially at the state and local levels) are desperately seeking new sources of revenue. In short, the market-place for online information, and the ability or desire to deliver it, are gelling at roughly the same moment in time.

Who wants this personal information？ Private investigators performing background checks or searching for deadbeat parents want it. Lawyers want it to track down court records and personal assets. So do prospective employers and landlords, to give you an electronic once-over before rolling out the welcome mat. And before you feel too affronted, it's to find a missing branch in the family tree or to check out a child-care worker.

Naturally, marketers want it as well—preferably in large quantities—to try to do what they always do. sell you stuff. They are using cyberspace to snap up e-mail lists and demographics databases to send solicitations to your onscreen in-box, as well as your postal mailbox. And as shopping by computer takes off, they'll want to know more about your online buying habits as well. One compromise in the works: commerce Net and the Electronic Frontier foundation are testing a system called eTrust that displays standard symbols informing you prior to buying anything online whether information about the transaction will be anonymous, customer-to-merchant only, or shared with other.

To be sure, the online arena is not the only place where your personal information is being collected and passed along. Smart cards and codes are being used to learn more about you in places as diverse as your state government and your local supermarket. Often, they will share the knowledge they gather with others. But nothing is spreading the information, or fueling the demand for it, faster than online connections.

The demand, coupled with a delivery vehicle of unprecedented efficiency and reach called the Internet, had spawned a booming market for services offering to help you find out more about other people (or them about you). Demand has also spawned a number of new privacy groups bent on curbing, or at least keeping close tabs on the inline information-for-sale industry. Many of these groups are themselves rooted online, and somewhat ironically, are populated by the same brand of free thinkers who routinely oppose any attempts to regulat

A．The Internet is annoying.

B．On the Internet, everyone knows your business.

C．Everyone should be online.

D．The Internet is connecting all the government agencies.