Social media has become an important source of info for many people. Social media companies themselves sell off our data, statistics and preferences for huge kickbacks from ad companies, more and more of which are becoming social media interfaces as well. Credit agencies use this info as well as they compile overall profiles of each person, which gets augmented by other info sources we sign away to get a cheap discount on something.
Then comes us...the PI. I love using social media as a source, however make note to never abuse it as a tool, which is an important distinction in developing these source types as opposed to merely thieving data to help push out products, as our investigations focus on legal data for the assistance in compiling a case for court.
People think that the biggest leak of info from social media that people can exploit is poor settings on privacy. While this info is indeed a goldmine for someone researching another individual, it often is not the only method.
A good investigator will look not only at what is plain and obvious, but will build link table s and relational charts on what is not there as well, plus look into second and third party affiliations to build a strong profile.
What people need to know on the privacy side though is how to keep data off of these pages which can harm them hen accessed by bad guys.
The first step here is to set a good password and not share your account info with anybody...and for the love of god change your password if you do and you break up with that person....immediately!
Next is always assume that all of your info can be shared online. Some sites like Facebook are pretty good at blocking out data thieves (of course only so that they are the only ones able to profit from it), but there are newer social media sites which can provide a ton of info, but are not yet mature enough to have a robust privacy policy and secure access points to user info.
Lastly, know who you are connected to and what they have access to. While I'm not here to lecture, I do not think that people need to befriend everyone who asks online to seem popular. These other people may not be as security conscious as you are, and once someone finds out you are associated to them, can be exploited to reveal info about you.
Blog post is courtesy Elemental Investigations: Private Investigator Edmonton, an Edmonton, Canada based private investigator agency. They can be found online at www.elementalpi.ca
No comments:
Post a Comment