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PleaseRobMe.com Reveals When You're Not at Home

by Warren Riddle on February 18, 2010 at 10:00 AM

Last summer, insurance firm Legal and General warned social networkers about the threat of criminals who actively monitor sites for updates about unattended homes. Even after thieves burgled the house of a Twitter and Facebook member who had posted "Gone to Hawaii for a week!" on the sites, people still aren't recognizing the dangers of frivolously posting location-specific information.

A new Web site could help to eliminate that nonchalance and naivety, though, with nothing more than its name. Please Rob Me locates tweets, status updates, and other social networking posts about being away from home, and consolidates them into one handy and easily locatable list. According to Mashable, the creators said their somewhat terrifying site isn't designed to be used by burglars or squatters, but is instead meant to serve as a "slap across the face" for people who publicly broadcast their activities.

The problem has dramatically expanded recently, particularly because more people are actually using their real names on many of these sites. Some services, like Google Buzz and Facebook, are also constantly embroiled in privacy disputes, so it's always important to manually update your settings to ensure that you protect your privacy and know exactly who is reading your status information. [From: Mashable]

Tags: crime, Facebook, funny, satire, SocialNetworking, top, Twitter

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