I am so upset .....

[sprintexec]

Hi all rootschatters,
Thank you so much for all your messages and thoughts.
Just to clarify I think I was shocked that my actual whole tree with me listed as living and all the additional family photographs etc information is shown on her Ancestry page when I really only have an extremely distant connection < 10cm DNA > with her.
I have never shared my log in details or sent her an invite to share over my tree as you are able to do on Ancestry.
As always you are all a wonderful community and really appreciate the rootschat forum.
Warmest regards and hope you all have a relaxing weekend.
Helen.

Thank you for providing such a stimulating topic. You really have caught the attention of this community. Based on what I have read here, I certainly will review the privacy levels of my Ancestry and other family tree notes. It would be good to think that you could speak to the person who has 'mined' your family data and ask why she feels such behaviour is OK. Perhaps it is symptomatic of the times in which we now live. KR Andy

[Gadget]

Heb66 has found that large parts of her tree have been copied to someone else's, not that someone else is managing to edit her tree without permission.

Jane :-)

Quite.

But not just parts - the whole tree:

I noticed yesterday she has the whole of my family tree and research appeared on her own Ancestry page listed as B family tree.

I'm wondering if the person has cracked the password or has so much time on their hands that the information has been carefully copied 

[Steve3180]

Interesting thread, I have a few observations

1/ The only safe way to proceed with Ancestry (and the Internet as a whole) is to assume that anything you upload is accessible to other people, sometimes a few, sometimes very many. If this bothers you, don't upload your tree.

2/ You don't need to put a copyright notice on photos that you have taken, it is automatic in the UK. That said to gain any protection from copyright law requires deep pockets and specialist lawyers.

3/ As others have said Ancestry's private tree setting is no protection, they could change the terms tomorrow. It is also not retrospective so that making a tree private after it was public only helps going forward. If other people (or Ancestry) have copied your stuff you have no control.

4/ Think twice before uploading any images of documents that you have bought to Ancestry, you will almost certainly not own the copyright on them and you have already explicitly given Ancestry the right to use them by accepting their terms and conditions. The privacy setting is irrelevant here.

Really point 1 is all that matters, the rest is cautionary. It's unlikely that point 4 would ever become an issue for the general user, but it's not impossible, a lot of Ancestry's terms are designed to indemnify themselves from any liability by passing it to the user and they can afford much better lawyers than you or I.

PS There used to be a program that could copy other peoples trees from Ancestry, they issued a Cease and Desist and it went away but I imagine similar things are still floating around the Internet.

[ikas]

I'm wondering if the person has cracked the password or has so much time on their hands that the information has been carefully copied 

Not an Anc expert but is it not just a case of the other person accepting a hint rather than manually copying it? In that case Anc will add the person and facts from the OP tree to the other person's tree. Caveat - I don't build my main tree on Anc, only Q&D ones so limited experience but I think that is the easy way to copy from another tree.

[Gillg]

I found a photograph of my mother's cousin, someone who I knew very well, posted on an American tree.  Apart from the fact that she was an unmarried only child with no children of her own, the photo had been attached to and mingled with the tree of someone of the same name but who was clearly not the same person.   I know her family's history well, and have never posted a picture of her, though I do actually possess a copy of the wrongly posted photo.  I did try to contact the owner of this tree but got no reply. 

[Gadget]

I'm wondering if the person has cracked the password or has so much time on their hands that the information has been carefully copied 

Not an Anc expert but is it not just a case of the other person accepting a hint rather than manually copying it? In that case Anc will add the person and facts from the OP tree to the other person's tree. Caveat - I don't build my main tree on Anc, only Q&D ones so limited experience but I think that is the easy way to copy from another tree.

I read Heb66 as saying that the whole tree was copied. It was identical - 800 entries.

[Biggles50]

I'm wondering if the person has cracked the password or has so much time on their hands that the information has been carefully copied 

Not an Anc expert but is it not just a case of the other person accepting a hint rather than manually copying it? In that case Anc will add the person and facts from the OP tree to the other person's tree. Caveat - I don't build my main tree on Anc, only Q&D ones so limited experience but I think that is the easy way to copy from another tree.

I read Heb66 as saying that the whole tree was copied. It was identical - 800 entries.

I read that but it does seem very strange.

Even with a Public Tree someone should nor be able to copy exactly any tree without specific Editing rights being given.

A discussion directly with Ancestry is IMO required on all our behalfs.

[jaywit]

One of the matches I have with a dodgy tree had when her tree first appeared a few weeks ago  600+ entries, it now has 1300+ entries, so she appears to be copying anything and everything she can.

[Pheno]

Is this not exactly what Thrulines does.  If there is a dna match and you use the 'evaluate' option, at the foot of that sidebar it asks if you would like to add this person to your tree.  If you only have the MRCA in your tree currently it will automatically add the descent down to the dna match, thus adding a whole line to the tree.

If the suggested Thruline is not correct when evaluated, it can still be added as a descent, again showing a whole line, but not to an actual MRCA, only to someone of the same name.

Pheno