The risks of social media

facebookThe risks of Facebook

Here are just a few pieces of information you can learn from the average Facebook account.

  • where you live
  • if your married
  • If your single
  • Age
  • where you work
  • what you drive
  • what you wear
  • what schools your kids go to
  • what schools you go to
  • where you shop
  • work history
  • what your email address is
  • what your phone number is
  • what hours you work
  • who your family members and friends are
  • where they work
  • what schedule they work
  • where they live
  • what they drive
  • if you drink
  • who you drink with
  • what you do for fun
  • what restaurants you typically frequent for lunch, dinner, and breakfast
  • WHEN and where you, your family, and even your friends will be going on vacation
  • and with a camera on every Android and iPhone, someone can literally see and post a picture of everything you own in the background even the silliest “harmless” picture for all to see.
  • what shows you watch
  • what interests you
  • the floor plan of your home and your friends’ homes
  • your approximate income
  • your spending habits
  • if you have large man-eating dogs

The risks of social media such as Facebook, Snapchat, and Twitter are never-ending and are just mind-blowing.

I recently responded to a call from a customer that was referred to me by another Atlanta locksmith. She had subsequently given a key to a neighbor 3 or 4 years prior just in case she were to get locked out, and she was requesting that I change her locks as I was doing so I asked her what was going on and why she was getting her locks changed, and this is her story. Firstly Her next-door neighbors’ daughters, boyfriends, and brother “still with me?” who had a drug problem was on Facebook and secondly had been looking through his brother’s pictures and had seen a picture of his brother cuddled up with his girlfriend at her house and in the background of a few of the pictures he was able to kind of compile a list of item.

Facebook is not the only risk

Meanwhile, her boyfriend’s brother posted a few Stock photos of a very large flat-screen tv on Criagslist.com with as much info as he could come up with. He managed to have about 15 people chomping at the bit ready to buy the tv, a laptop, and few guns, and a few other items that he had seen in a few of the pictures. Meanwhile, He discovered that the two families would be leaving Dec 8  to go on vacation together but had no plans to even go into my customer’s house until he found the key hanging on a hook labeled “Alison’s House” whose name he knew from Facebook and also knew would be out of town.

After breaking into the first home and entering the second home with a key he took everything he could grab and knew there wasn’t an alarm at the first house so he could take his time but come to find out the second did but he just picked up the home phone dialed 2 or 3 or 4 just to get rid of the dial tone so that when the security system picked up to dial the monitoring station the system wouldn’t be able to dial anything without a dial tone and then he ripped the siren out of the wall and took his time taking whatever he wanted.

You don’t have to avoid social media you just have to be careful.

The police estimated that between the TVs, laptops, guns, Ipads, and jewelry, he would have made off with about $25,000, all with the help of Facebook. Now I know what you’re wondering, how did he get caught? Well, come to find out the daughters boyfriends druggy brother had a girlfriend that loved the new necklace he gave her so much that she posted a picture of it with the caption “Jake is so sweet” and the lady’s daughter had given her mother the necklace and it was the only thing her boyfriend’s brother hadn’t sold.

This is just one story of the risks of Facebook I have heard as an Atlanta area Locksmith but I have heard so many I can’t even begin to tell you half of them. Many say that having a Facebook account is like putting a camera in your living room I hope after reading this article you can see it is FAR WORSE.