Catfish...Predator Fish

While watching the movie Catfish as part of my contemporary moral issues and technology philosophy class, I couldn’t help but think this is crazy. These people have put a ton of personal information about themselves out there for everyone to see. This is scary how much I know about these people just from what they’ve posted on the Internet in these few minutes watching this film.

            I could tell where they lived, what they looked like, where they worked, what there interests were, a relative idea of how much money they had, how old their children were and what they looked like. Angela’s family ended up being fake but Nev’s ability to track her and her family down simply by visiting a mailbox and checking mail further goes to prove my point on how easy targeting someone through social media is. The fact that Angela was able to fool Nev into assuming so much about her and sharing so much also goes to show how easy targeting people over social media can be.

            As a parent this was a wake up call to me on the severity of properly managing the content provided on social media for my family and myself. As a father it is my job to protect my family and part of that is ensuring that not everyone who has access to an internet connection can get information they would need to target my family and cause them harm whether it be theft, child abduction, assault, murder or any of the other crazy things that people do.

           

Here are some things that I found I needed to be more careful with:

• ·         Removing Locational Information from Photographs
• ·         Ensuring Only Family & Friends Have Access to Personal Information
• ·         Removing Access to Personal Phone Numbers
• ·         Posting About Time Intervals at Which I Would Be Away from My Family
• ·         Posting About Times When Our Family Would Be Away from Our Residence
• ·         Posting About Any Type of Expensive Purchase Made

I could see how many would find this to seem a bit drastic so here are some other sources for information.

http://www.zdnet.com/article/infographic-80-of-robbers-check-twitter-facebook-google-street-view/

http://abc7news.com/travel/burglars-use-social-media-to-find-next-victims/448107/

http://www.ibtimes.com/how-burglars-use-facebook-target-vacationing-homeowners-1341325

https://www.komando.com/tips/12469/4-ways-burglars-use-social-media-to-target-you/all

      Obviously there is a balance to being prepared and protective and being over paranoid. I leave that balance to you to find. As for me and my house, I will be a little more careful as to what I share over the internet in the future.