[tinotopia]

Netflix used to make it very difficult to find any of their customer service contact addresses or phone numbers.

I have an old blog post with a title that includes the word 'Netflix' and the phrase 'Customer Service', where I ramble on about a whole bunch of things; the content of the post is about a general principle that I think Netflix was illustrating, not about Netflix itself. The title, though, resulted in the post showing up high in search results for 'Netflix customer service'.

Three people attempted to address Netflix customer service via the comments box; one of them posted his phone number. Another posted his postal address and credit card information.

I posted a comment making it explicit that all appearances to the contrary notwithstanding, this blog post was not, in fact, Netflix customer service HQ.

A year later another guy posted another Netflix customer service request, right under my 'This is not Netflix' message.

[simonw]

The absolute worst example of this kind of thing I've seen was a bunch of years ago when a blogger posted a short note that mentioned the words "suicide chat room" in it. The comments turned in to a chat room for people considering suicide. Over a thousand of them.