Accepting 'Friends' on Facebook

I recently saw this on the news and got me thinking about school (http://www.ctvnews.ca/sci-tech/like-my-status-you-got-served-on-facebook-1.1950935). The short story is Manitoba Public Insurance was trying to track down person to serve him with a legal document. After several different attempts to contact the person, MPI created a fake Facebook profile with a photo of a female who the person DID NOT know. Once the person accepted the 'Friend Request' from MPI's fake Facebook profile, the person in question was served with a notice to appear in court.

The person is now angry that he was served with legal documents by a fake Facebook profile. The person needs to consider his digital identity and look at himself first.

I see this at school ALL THE TIME. Young people (not limited to young people) often accept 'Friend Requests' from people they don't know, sometimes ending in nasty consequences. In this case, the person accepted a 'friend request' from someone who they likely thought was attractive (the picture on the Facebook profile was of a young lady in a bikini). The person had NO IDEA who this friend request was coming from. They just saw a person in a bikini... resulting in being served with legal papers. There are worse consequences from accepting 'friend requests' from people who you don't know online. In the online world, if you really don't know the person who you are talking to, it could be anyone.

So, be careful of who you 'befriend' online. You never really know who may be at the other end. If you don't know them in person,  you haven't met them in real life... you aren't friends. Don't be friends with them online.

This person got busted by his own curiosity of a pretty young lady in a bikini, and the lack of his own security online (hopefully MPI had the sense to use an image for the Facebook profile that was not protected). This is a perfect example of an unintended consequence of accepting a friend request online from someone who you DO NOT KNOW and the reliance of the person setting up the account of you DOING SO. Only you are in control of who you connect with online. Once you do, you lose some control. This person could have avoided this entire situation by not clicking 'accept'. Well, this whole situation could have been avoided in a number of ways I'm sure but that's a whole different blog post.

I hope everyone is having a safe and fun summer!

Mr. Mead