Youth increasingly aware of online privacy but more likely to take risks in posting information

Social media sites like Facebook have become a ubiquitous presence in the lives of young people and many parents may worry that their children are giving away too much information.

However, technology experts say there is little substantial risk in the online personas being tailored by image-savvy teenagers who post pictures and details of their social lives. On the other hand, the longevity of online material can have a long-term impact on the lives of young people.

“From the perspective of youth, the main concern is overexposure or embarrassment, which is to say that people are concerned that what they post online will be seen by unintended audiences,” said Matthew Johnson, director of education at the Media Awareness Network, a non-profit organization that promotes digital literacy among Canadians.

Often, this unintended audience includes parents and authority figures, but the content can also be distributed to a wider audience for malicious reasons.

Read Full Article from CBC News

HIV-positive man charged in 2nd assault on women met through online dating

A 56-year-old, HIV+ man charged with two sexual assaults on women he met through online dating. One was a teenage girl that met when he picked her up at summer camp. Both were unaware of his HIV status and investigators believe there may be others that also engaged in unprotected sex with him.
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Fox2 St. Louis features ProtectedPix: "Website Lets You Have Control Over Online Pictures"

 

Where will your picture turn up?

Students at Big Bear High School in California were recently threatened with charges of possession of child pornography after an inappropriate picture was found to be printed in the school’s yearbook.  The photo, showing a 17-year old male and 15-year old female, both students, engaged in sexual behavior at a school function.  They were not the focus of the photo but in the back ground.  Once the content was discovered the school recalled the yearbook.  The case has been turned over to the district attorney’s office and the 17-year old student may be charged with a sex crime.

Photo Scandal: Congressman Anthony Weiner won't confirm if tweeted pic is of him or not

UPDATE: Anthony Weiner resigned from Congress, ending a three-week scandal over his online behavior. Read full NY Times Story 

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Dating site Match.com says it will begin screening its users against sex offender registry

Singles website Match.com announced that it will begin screening its users against the national sex offender registry after a woman filed a lawsuit against the company saying she had been assaulted by someone she met through the dating service. Read Full Article

Google making app that would identify people's faces

Google is working on a mobile application that would allow users to snap pictures of people's faces in order to access their personal information.

Just as Google has crawled trillions of Web pages to deliver results for traditional search queries, the system could be programmed to associate pictures publicly available on Facebook, Flickr and other photo-sharing sites with a person's name
Read full CNN article

Man accused of raping women he met on online dating site

An Irvine, CA man accused of creating fake accounts on an online dating site MillionaireMatch.com, meeting women and then raping them.

Joseph Raymond Garcia, 51, allegedly met two of his victims on, an online dating site that bills itself as “the first, largest and most effective site in the world to connect with, date and marry successful, beautiful people.”

According to the Orange County district attorney’s office, Garcia allegedly created a personal profile in which he claimed to make more than $200,000 a year and described himself as “sophisticated, charming” and “strikingly handsome.”

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GPS in Cameras and Phones Create Privacy Issue

Dating Sites: Watch out for scam artists, felons and sex offenders...

When you post and share your photos and personal information you do not really know who you are communicating with or what their intention is. 

Safety experts say popular dating sites can be a digital mine field, filled with danger from scam artists, felons and even sex offenders.

Are background checks the answer?  Dating sites say no, we say just be more selective about who you share your secrets (and photos) with.

Read the story

Congressman Chris Lee Resigns over Shirtless Photo and Craigslist Post

New York politician resigns after his shirtless photo and emails surfaces online.  According to reports, Republican Chris Lee, a 46-year old married congressman and father, responded to a personal ad posted on craigslist claiming to be a 39-year-old divorced lobbyist.

We are not so sure what is so shocking here: people misrepresent themselves online all the time, craigslist is reportedly more popular in terms of posting volume than other dating sites (including Match.com and eHarmony)-of course a percentage of the Ads or responses will involve a married person as married affairs are nothing new, and if you email your pictures or post them online you run the risk of having them seen by other people-especially when you do not even know who you are sending them to.

If you want to protected your online reputation you should use ProtectedPix. In the meantime you can read the full story.

Man robbed at knifepoint by woman he met on an online dating site

Finding the perfect mate may not always be the intention of certain people who are viewing your photos and online dating profiles. 

 

Recently a 28-year-old  woman was charged with first-degree robbery after she allegedly threatened her date, a man she met on an dating website, with a knife and stole his money. 

 

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NJ cyberbully forwarded lewd photos, gets 45 days

Source: The Associated Press

By: Maryclaire Dale

A New Jersey man who used a teen's lewd online photos to cyberbully him is going to prison for 45 days.

Prosecutors say 20-year-old Bergenfield resident Matthew Bean joined an "electronic mob" that tried to drive the victim to suicide.

U.S. District Judge Anita Brody calls the crime "extremely malicious." She says she hopes it teaches the victim and other teens "the stupidity of sexting."

The teen had posted the sexually explicit photos of himself when he was 12 or 13. The FBI says they surfaced on a website five years later.

Bean admits he forwarded the photos to the teen's Philadelphia-area school. The victim didn't commit suicide and is now in college.

Bean also will serve five years of probation after pleading guilty to a federal stalking charge.

Dear Abby: Online Reputation is Key in Today's Job Market

Dear Abby:

A former student asked me to write a character reference to help her land a teaching job abroad. I agreed, since I thought highly of her potential as a teacher and scholar, and her level of character. However, after she was placed in the classroom, the ministry of education of the nation where she was to teach discovered some inappropriate posting on her social networking site.
Because I had written the recommendation, they contacted me asking if they had a problem and provided me with copies of what they had found. Her posting detailed a history of forging fake IDs to buy alcohol while underage, numerous episodes of binge drinking in high school and college, marijuana use and several exhibitionistic stunts and sexual activities that I won’t mention. I was shocked. None of this matched the person I thought I knew.

When I tried to contact her to let her know she had been discovered, she rebuffed my inquiries and cut off all contact. Her parents’ response was denial and to “kill the messenger.” I have been left with the problem of how to respond to the ministry’s questions.

Ordinarily, I would not want my signature associated with someone with those behaviors and attitudes, but this young woman is in legal jeopardy abroad. I still don’t know if what she wrote is true, but I find it highly problematic that she would portray herself as she did.

This situation has so shaken my trust in the character and judgment of the 20-something crowd that I’m now reluctant to write recommendations for any of my students. What do you think I should have done? I’m concerned that too many of these young people, however intelligent, lack integrity, character, judgment and common sense.

Heartbroken Teacher
Oakland, California


Read Dear Abby's Response 

Bullies circulating nude photos takes toll on girls

Picture this: A bunch of 15-year-olds are watching television in the basement, half tuned to a hockey game, half tuned to their cellphones. And then, to their surprise, the image of a nude girl, one of their classmates, appears on one of their phones. What do they do? They send it on.

Thoughtless fun or malicious bullying?

Legal or illegal?

Read On

Hosea Chancez from The Game authenticates leaked nude pictures

Hosea Chancez, an actor best known for his role on the TV series The Game, confirmed through Twitter that the nude images leaked of him online where taken of him however, he denies being aware that the pictures were taken and believes that somebody took these pictures from outside of his hotel room.

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Man used Facebook to hack women's emails & sent their nude pics to contacts

A California man has admitted using personal information collected from Facebook to hack into women's e-mail accounts, then send nude pictures of them to everyone in their address book.
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Trained boxer, who advertised himself as a "porn star”, convicted of murder after Plentyoffish.com hook-up

PORT ALBERNI, B.C. — A Canadian man has been convicted of killing a male nurse he met for sex through an online dating website.

A jury convicted Kim Winslow Rothgordt, 43, of second-degree murder this past week in the death of James Shannon, 52, who was found dead in February 2008.

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