The other day I blogged about Angelina Jolie being on Facebook, and then I did a follow-up article on the result of my post, and it was very interesting to read the feedback I got from some readers.
“I definitely think it is her, she would want a profile”
“It must be her, who else could it be?”
After reading comments like the ones above, it became apparent to me, that people certainly don’t realise the ease of fooling someone on Facebook, and it’s a general concensus that people are not aware of how vulnerable they have made themselves by signing up on Facebook. From the very first day I signed up, I made a point of reading the privacy terms and conditions to find out how open my account would be – yes, it did scare me, but as a blog author, most of my details are already online, so for me I felt it was alright, but for a lot of people, this is the first time they are publishing all their details online, and they don’t realise how dangerous it is.
For years, people have talked about “Older perverted men manipulating younger women into meeting them at secluded locations” – and it’s been proven, and is very obvious, that this happens more often than we like to admit. Most bloggers and regular Internet users have an understanding of this, but what about those who simply check email or Google? As a person who IS informed, would you feel comfortable with your children publishing all their details online? Personally, I don’t think I would be too comfortable with it!
Anyway, I went off topic somewhat there, but it is related to the title in the fact that people are impersonating other people. I once again did a search for a popular actor/singer, this time Jessica Alba, and the results were really interesting:
Which one is the real Jessica Alba? Perhaps neither one of the four is actually here, and all four accounts are fake! Now, let’s apply this in another way to tie up with everything else. Let’s say there’s a boy called Mark, who goes to school with Lucy and John. Lucy and John have been dating for some time now, and Mark is horribly jealous as he wants Lucy. Lucy and Mark are familiar with Facebook, John on the other hand isn’t aware of it, and doesn’t seem too phased. What would happen if Mark created a Facebook account pretending to be John?! The chances are Lucy would figure it out rather quickly once she had asked John, but what happens if she didn’t? Things could get extremely dangerous.
This is just a very down tone example, but the truth of the matter is that this is very possible, and you can imagine the danger in such a situation.
I’m longing to see how Facebook will be towards the end of 2007, because I honestly feel that Facebook is the cancer of the Internet!
I actually found a few more Jessica Alba’s on there. About 8 in total I think.
Ya, I think they increase daily!
The second one on the list is me. Honest :)
Haha, thanks for popping in Jess darling :P
People even seem to go as far a setting certain privacy settings to make the profile seem real too. For example there’s one in the search list that I saw recently that you can only send a message to or only poke, which I would assume is a ploy to make the person feel that she wouldn’t want just anyone adding her. Although I must admit I would have liked to believe that Jessica Alba really was on facebook I think it would be cool to get to know her.
Ye Kyle, there’s that whole ‘limited profile’ setting, which is rather useful. What I often do when someone adds me, and I am not really a friend friend of theres, I dump them into that ‘limited’ list ;)
Yes, Jessica would be a nice friend to have in the NON ‘limited’ list ye :)
Shot for leaving a comment!
Thanks for the timely response and advice, I guess it’s true a lot of people never really sit down and think about what they’re putting on their profiles these days.
PS. you wouldn’t happen to know her would you ;)
Ye, I’ve actually been wondering about canceling my account – I have over 400 contacts attached to me, of which half are people I’ve known, but never talk to anymore, and it’s bugging me that so many people have access to everything about me – even with the ‘limited profiling’.
Ye, I actually do know her hey, through a friend it turns out :) My aunt worked for Loreal, and deals with models on a day to day basic, and her friend turned out to be a big shot model, whom my aunt introduced me too. She actually came in the top 3 for a recent modeling competition, but that’s as much information as I can give away unfortunately.
So, in the end, I guess it was only a semi-stalk :P
Wow over 400 eh? You may as well be as famous as she is lol. Yeah the only thing I’ve done with my facebook account is just leave out specific details you know? Anything I don’t want people to know about me I just leave it to them to ask me if they really want to know that badly. Even then it’s still up to me to assess whether or not to give it to them you know?
Well I must say I’m a little envious that you know her man and I appreciate the information you did post there and don’t worry I understand you can’t anymore away that’s cool. Man I hope someday I get an opportunity like that.
In the Facebook terms and conditions, it states that at any point that Facebook wish to look at your profile, they are permitted to remove your account if your profile does not contain all your up-to-date personal information.
Paul Jacobson, a lawyer, wrote an article on it, I think you could find it by googling for his name..
Kyle, try joining some groups then bud, there are tons and tons of people wanting to chat and meet and stuff, it’s pretty hectic when you get really involved!
Chat to you soon :)
Interesting, I brought up the point with a friend of mine and he claims that would most likely be something they would say to cover their butts in terms of liability but the frequency they probably check is seldom.
I was also exploring your site earlier today and noticed that you have a link to a group in facebook I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind my joining the group. I’m actually rather enjoying the conversation we have going here.
Hi Kyle, I popped over to Pauls website, and found part 1 of the article, and there is also a part 2, this is the link:
http://www.jacobson.co.za/2007/07/can-you-trust-facebook/
Paul has some very interesting things to say about Facebook, you might want to take a look.
Not a problem bud, I frequent the groups occasionally, but recently I have not been on Facebook too much, other than just checking private messages, etc. But, yes, of course you may join the group!
I agree, this conversation is great, it’s a pity one or two others won’t join in. Perhaps Paul will see the back link, and come comment.
Hey Chris, yeah I read that article you posted there, it’s very interesting it seems as though facebook just tries to clear itself of all liabilities saying that no matter what they do the responsibility is still on you and your own discretion of what to put up, however I still need to read part 2 and see what happened in there but awesome work on pulling that up bud.
I went ahead and joined your group on facebook there, looking forward to more discussions and meeting new people man.
Ye bro, well, I guess these multi-million-dollar companies need some serious paper work to cover themselves in every aspect!
Cool for joining my group, but people just don’t seem to chat in groups that much, and I cannot figure out why!
I’ll check my groups again just now, and perhaps we can start a conversation, and get some people interested :)
Yeah man for sure I just read the 2nd part of Paul’s article and it is exactly as I said. They remove all liability by placing the responsibility on you, as a user, to use your own discretion when posting material. Furthermore they go on to specify terms for if a claim was to be made against them that it would uphold in a California court and as Paul said in his article, “foreign place, foreign laws.” They made it so that even if you wanted to make a claim, on top of covering legal fees you’d have to get your butt down to California and unless the crime committed was as severe as Paul’s, adding some credit card number theft and other personal information, who is actually going to go through all that trouble?
It would be awesome if we could get Paul in here to add to the conversation, it should make for some interesting talk
As for the group man I appreciate the welcome and would be more than happy to stimulate any discussion I can contribute to. Perhaps a good topic is how the art of conversation is lost in some people, lol ;).
Totally, it’s too early in the morning for me to comment intelligently, hehe, but I agree with what you are saying. I wish someone would write another article on the matter, from an educated perspective.
Group.. Not a problem, and yes, content is key, therefore a good topic will result in much activity :) Let’s see what we can do!
Have a fantastic day mate.
Hey Chris buddy, sorry I fell off the grid there for a moment. I had some serious work to get done, kept me busy for a while however I would like to continue our conversation. Any luck with trying to encourage Paul into the conversation?
Hey bud, good to hear from you! Hope the work went well, as you can see from my latest post, I’m a bit swamped my side too :)
I’ve not heard from Paul here unfortunately.
I would like to come here again. It sounds god to me, and there’s a lot of interesting information here
Very glad you found something you like!
Hey Chris bro I hope you didn’t go thinking I forgot about you now. I know I haven’t been in constant touch but you know how it is when you’re finishing up your final year of university. Things can get pretty busy. I see this little discussion is still drawing a crowd so I thought I’d drop in and say hi and find out what’s new, both with you and the topics. Be good to hear from you bud.
Cheers!
Hey bud, not at all, I figured you were really busy and knew that you would be back one day :)
It’s good to see that you’re back on track, hopefully enjoying my articles and spreading the word ;)
Keep well bud and hope to chat more often!
Jessica Alba, I think she’s one of the most unique beauties this world has known in a very long time.