A 19 year old who posted about an expensive jewellery inheritance on his Instagram account may have regretted that decision after 3 armed robbers came knocking.
Soon after the misguided posts were made, a 19 year old from Philadelphia had 3 men wearing ski masks and armed with pistols breaking down his door.
And whilst no one was hurt, the robbers got away with a gold Rolex and two gold chains and remain on the loose, according to local news reports.
Whilst it isn’t currently certain if the robbery was a result of the Instagram posts, it still serves as a reminder that social media users should be aware of what information they post onto social networks.
And this certainly wouldn’t be the first time robberies have been based on the social media activity of their victims. In 2012 a teenage girl posted a picture of a large amount of money onto her Facebook account. It was only several hours that passed before robbers came knocking.
In 2014 a woman from California posted her vacation plans on Facebook, only for a “friend” on her contact list to try and rob her while she was away. It was only pure luck that police in the area managed to interrupt the break-in.
Sites like Instagram have their privacy settings set to public by default, meaning anyone with an Instagram account can see what you’re posting. Photos can also be geo-tagged, meaning they provide an approximate location to where the photo was taken.
Of course these features can be disabled. For information on making your Instagram posts private you can read the Instagram help page here.
A housemates of the victim who wasn’t in at the time of the robbery said regarding the motivation for the crime…
“Definitely someone affiliated with him – had to be one of his friends or a friend of a friend. I think it was a set up.”
Well, with friends like that, who’d need enemies?