KSLA News 12 Shreveport, Louisiana |How Facebook could be hazardous to your wealth

How Facebook could be hazardous to your wealth

By Liz Elan - bio | email

CITY, STATE (KSLA) - As the popularity of social media sites grows and explodes, stories about the dark side of social networking are piling up.

Are you going through a messy divorce? Twitter, MySpace and Facebook could be a gold mine of evidence to get you to pay up.

Looking for a job? A recent study found 45% of employers used these sites to check up on job candidates. The same study showed 35% of those employers did not offer a candidate a job because of what they found.

You wouldn't stand up in the middle of a crowd of strangers and announce you are going on vacation, and then tell everyone your address, would you?  Well, aren't you doing the same thing when you post that same info online.

"You could look on their Facebook, MySpace or whatever else they are using and know everywhere they are going, that they are not at home is the issue," says Det. Paula Moreno with the Shreveport Police Department.

"I don't say exactly where, just road trip," said one Facebook user.   "I always say I am on vacation," said another.

 Det. Moreno says "we tell them not to post pictures that show their house in there. Sometimes you don't notice there's the tag number to your mom's car or the street sign that shows exactly where you live."

 Social networking can also be a dream come true for identity thieves. "You can get their physical address. There is a place for their birthday down to the year."

Is your profile private? Well, you still need to hear this.

  Just last week there was a huge phishing scam targeting Facebook and Twitter.  One victim says "I got like four Facebook messages."

Scammers sent direct messages like "You're in this video" or "I think I see you," and when users clicked, they were asked to log in with their username and password and all of a sudden your info, not so private.

 "I saw people on Facebook saying I don't know where this is coming from so ignore it."  A veteran move. And goes to show you don't need to quit, just understand what could come back to bite you.

   "Your entire life is on that site and how much do you want strangers to know," said Det. Moreno.