3 Stories that should make you check your Facebook privacy settings

Learning how to cope with social media in our lives was never going to be a straightforward journey, as we share more about ourselves online than ever before.

And of course there has been so many different privacy & security nightmare tales that have resulted because of social media.

Most of these stories could have been easily prevented if their victims had been more prudent concerning both their online security and their social media privacy settings. To illustrate the potential consequences of being too cavalier with your online persona, we detail 3 real life stories where it all went very, very wrong.

We also explain how the entire debacle could have probably been avoided completely.

3. Facebook account hacked; pictures stolen

Jasmine Jones, 23 had her email account compromised in 2013. As is often the result of a hacked email account, other online accounts can subsequently be compromised too, and in this case Jones also had her Facebook account compromised, with hackers accessing her private social media account, stealing over 300 personal photos as well as acquiring much of her personal information.

A compromised Facebook account can be annoying enough, but what the hackers did with her photos was horrifying. Fake Facebook accounts were setup in Jones’ name, along with her photos and other personal details about her.

However, these fake accounts advertised her as an escort and the hackers behind them used them to engage other Facebook users in a series of online scams, including the ‘friend in crisis’ extortion scam. Jasmine’s photo and name were being used as a front for a number of scams, including one that tricked a man into handing over £250.

Facebook closed the accounts once they were reported, but others kept popping back up in what was a futile “whack-a-mole” scenario. The police couldn’t help.

Needless to say, having your identity used in such a manner is both terrifying and frustrating. Your physical safety becomes an issue, and your online identity can be left in tatters, and with an increasing number of employers turning to social media for background checks on potential job candidates, this is a very serious issue.

What could have been done – and what should you do – to avoid this? Whilst the details on how the hackers compromised Jones’ email account and subsequently her Facebook account are unclear, it could almost certainly have been avoided if her account as two-factor authentication enabled via SMS.

If this has been turned on, the hackers would have had to enter a PIN code before being able to access the account, since they would have been using Facebook from a device unrecognised by her account. Since Jones was presumably in possession of her phone, the hackers would not have been able to do this. Two factor authentication is a vital security feature that we recommend everyone enables if they have personal information stored on their account, which most people invariably do.

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2. Cloned Facebook page

Regardless of the privacy settings of your status updates or photos, you can still be the victim of a Facebook cloning scam. This is was Joseph Giacalone discovered when a scammer cloned his account by creating a new account and using his profile name and profile picture – two pieces of information you cannot hide from other Facebook users.

With the duplicate profile picture and name, Giacalone essentially had an indentical twin on Facebook. An unwanted, malicious twin. To make matters worse, the duplicate account began friend requesting Giacalone’s friend list, tricking his friends into accepting the request thinking it was him.

Joseph Giacalone only realised what was happening when his friends started asking why he was demanding money from them. Certainly an embarrassing situation to find yourself in, especially if you have work colleagues or even superiors on your friends list.

The scammers had used the duplicate account to launch a series of confidence trick on Giacalone’s Facebook friends.

What could have been done – and what should you do – to avoid this? To stop your account being cloned you have to be careful you only have trusted people on your friends list and that you make your own friends list private from people who are not your friends on Facebook.

Facebook cloning scammers will clone accounts where they can see that accounts contact list, so they have potential targets for when they clone the account. To make your friends list private, [for desktop users] click friends on your timeline and click the pencil icon and “Edit Privacy”.

More information on Facebook cloning scams here.

1. Fired via Facebook

Losing your job thanks to your Facebook activity is something that has become increasingly common, with an ever growing number of jobs these days coming attached with social media policies governing what you can and cannot do on social media platforms.

This is exactly what happened to a North Carolina teacher who listed “teaching chitlins in the ghetto of Charlotte” in the Interests section of her Facebook profile.

The teacher also wrote “I am teaching in the most ghetto school in Charlotte”in her About Me section.

Her comments led to her superintendent recommending her to be fired based on those comments.

What could have been done – and what should you do – to avoid this? The relationship between your personal social media account and your job is perhaps one of the most trickiest relationships you’ll have to deal with on sites like Facebook.

Users demand the right to express their own opinions on their personal accounts, yet businesses want to retain the right not to be seen in a bad light on the Internet.

A good piece of advice would be to create a disconnect between your personal account and your workplace. This includes not listing where you work or what you work as, and don’t post details on social media that could identify your workplace, even if you don’t explicitly reveal where it is.

This method means that an employer may not be able to effectively argue that any comments you make will reflect badly on them.

Of course this is not a guarantee, so the best course of action here is to just refrain from commenting about your workplace on social media if the said comment could be interpreted in a negative light, which is what our North Carolina teacher should have done, in an ideal world.

Getting your privacy settings right is also important here. We don’t know if the teacher in our story had her superintendent on her friends list, but if her About Me section was public, it wouldn’t have mattered. Make sure the information you provide in the About Me section, as well as your timeline, is set to Friends Only.