<p>I've been browsing around, and it seems that, if an admissions officer like MIT Chris really wanted to, he could match a profile on CC to a real person in his admissions office. My question is: do they? Some users' stats could be easily traceable to certain applicants, which is why I'm asking.</p>
<p>I can’t say for admissions officers at other top schools, but admissions officers at MIT don’t do this. </p>
<p>From Ben Jones, who was the Chris of the admissions office before Chris was the Chris of the admissions office, [here](<a href=“http://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/your_profile_on_the_web_can_it]here[/url]:”>Your Profile On The Web: Can It Hurt You? | MIT Admissions):</a>
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<p>At any rate, from my perspective as a CC mod, there are not many things that people typically post on CC that are harmful in any way to their applications to MIT. If you post a stats thread, or ask questions about life at MIT, or are otherwise generally interested and curious, that’s not problematic. If you are a total jerkwad ***<strong><em>bag, well… you’re a total jerkwad *</em></strong>**bag, but that’s more your problem (and mine as a mod) than it is MITChris’ problem.</p>
<p>Thanks for your response. I was wondering because of this post by MIT Chris in the “Let’s Talk About Race Some More, Because That’s Always Fun” thread:</p>
<p>“IvyHopeful’s posted profile does not appear to match any applicants in our database. And that’s all I’ll say about that.”</p>
<p>That seems to indicate that some CC users are compared to databases at MIT’s admissions office.</p>
<p>Besides that, though, a more general question: How often do the officers recognize students from CC in their applicant pile or at MIT? I would think that a particular stand-out applicant could be matched to his/her CC profile quite easily. For anyone with experience, does this happen frequently?</p>
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That would fall under my “jerkwad ******bag” characterization from above. 
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<p>There have been a handful of cases, including that one, where posters have made up amazing profiles and pretended that they were rejected from MIT. In those few cases, Chris (or Ben, when he was here) has determined that (surprise surprise!) those posters are lying. But even in these few cases, this has been done post hoc, not prior to admission.</p>
<p>In that case at least, it doesn’t seem like CC posts were looked at in making admissions decisions but rather liars were caught after decisions came out.</p>
<p>I don’t believe I ever asked if admissions officers did this to help decide if a candidate is right for a school–although that may be what people most commonly ask. I was just wondering if they ever did it, as I find it interesting that people reveal so much about themselves on CC (myself included). I can imagine the surprise when a “Chance Me” CC’er appears in front of an admissions officer in real life–and the officer recognizes him/her.</p>