Echoing my echo of my siren call of 1 and 6 weeks ago (see If It Pleases M'Laud and Your Face or Mine), a market research company had an 'MBO Moment' this week - Master of the Bleeding Obvious for those not versed in the expression - when their prison survey came to the less-than-startling conclusion that the modern British 'tea-leaf' uses Facetwat and Twitbook to target their obliging victims.
I say "obliging", as they'd be safer leaving their front doors open with a HELP YOURSELF sign outside - certainly a lot less 'interested parties' would actually get to hear about it that way !! Apparently, the majority of offenders who took part in the survey admitted that they used social media to pinpoint houses and cars etc as potential targets ... .. in fact 4-out-of-5 felons reportedly 'fessed-up' to using this method, which - if my maths is correct - puts the survey on-a-par with Cat Whiskers and their long-time claim that 8-out-of-10 catburglars prefer their food.
With one Old Lag quoted in the press no-less as having said that "We're living in the age of the digital criminal and people are taking advantage of social media to access information about would-be victims", the only question that remains to be asked is Why-on-Earth do people still engage in this digital diarrhoea ?! Now, let's get behind the mind-set of these 'Twits', who broadcast to the world-at-large about their latest 98 inch telly or the hi-fi they pilfered from Curries during the riots ... .. okay, let's say some bloke's just bought himself a Lamborghini and wants to show-off to his mates and fancies impressing the ladies while he's at it ... .. so the tweet would go something like this "Guess wot, I've got a new Lambo, form a queue outside # 25 Acacia Avenue if you fancy a shag" ... .. and, by the time our Twat woke-up from his exertions, he may well have a WAG or three to show for his troubles, but his pride-and-joy will already be half-way to Nigeria in a shipping container !!
Compounding this verbal diarrhoea, we then have Google Street View, which directs 'uninvited guests' directly to your door - more often than not your back door - and allows them to 'case-the-joint' from the comfort of their no doubt stolen 3-piece-suite. Google Street View and Google Earth are the biggest invasions of privacy ever known to man and they should never have been allowed to provide close-up views of people's homes - other than a heavily pixelated, birds-eye view perhaps. In fact, if the owners and occupants of every residential property in the country filed privacy complaints with Google Earth - as Web Sheriff has had to do on numerous occasions on behalf of concerned clients - we could bring the whole edifice crashing-down ... .. meanwhile, maybe some of their senior executives would like blow-ups of their homes published on-line for the benefit of our Whiskers friends.
The irony here is that, with so many people publishing personal information on-line who really shouldn't, when you actually need personal information for a valid purpose, it's either not there or is hidden behind some 'privacy service', the likes of which should be outlawed. In fact we had two such cases this very week ... .. in the first, a prolific 'leaker' had been busy uploading stolen, unreleased material by a very major artist on web-sites all-over the net and yet had managed to cover-his-tracks - or so he thought ... .. ultimately, however, some on-line sleuthing coupled with some traditional gum-shoe work brought the villain to justice (so to speak) ... .. and, in a second, similar case, but this time dealing with the fraudulent registration of other people's names as domain names, we're about to issue a US court subpoena in order to finally unearth the identity of the miscreant.
SO, there-you-have-it ... .. digital diarrhoea or a healthy dose of i-Modium (aka 'Put-A-Sock-In-It') ... .. take your choice and just remember that there's plenty more room in that shipping container for the contents of your living room !!