Internet safety

#Internet Safety – Stalkers… know the signs | Daily Echo

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Don't be an easy target
Don’t be an easy target

 

Today’s topic is one I sometimes discuss with other authors, especially when I want to know if this is happening to them, and how frequently.

I often daily, get invitations from male strangers to befriend them. The majority of these invitations come from Google, Facebook, Goodreads, and Skype alerts.

 

As a person who is pretty well-versed on the world wide web, I’m pretty good at sniffing out the predators. My FBI-like tendencies send me off on social searches to find out more about these people before I accept any invitations. If I’m not familiar with their name I begin checking their profiles on social media to see what they’re about, if they’re authors or bloggers, if they have any posts from their websites, etc. Quite often there’s nothing to tell me anything about them and I hit delete. On Skype I don’t even look, I auto delete because there is no reason for anyone to have to Skype me that doesn’t already know me.

As an author with a very public profile, there are almost too many easy avenues to contact me, so I am always on guard before befriending strangers. But for others, particularly those who don’t have a public profile yet who are still visible on the web with their social media made public, they need to do their due diligence when it comes to accepting new ‘friends’ into their circles and sharing their personal lives with some of these predators who usually make first contact with compliments and sharing their relationship status.

In light of this important topic, I’d like to share a post that author/blogger Sue Vincent from the Daily Echo recently put up on her blog.

Stalkers . . .Know The Signs

 

Posted on November 14, 2015 by

 

 

We all have different criteria and reasons for using any of the various social networks. For most of us, it is simply that… a place to meet friends, both old and new. I’ve just been through my inbox for one of those networks hitting delete. There are doubtless a lot of gentlemen on Google + and other social networks who are completely genuine. There will certainly be hopeful romantics amongst them who are simply hoping to connect with Miss Right.

Then there are the others. . . CONTINUE READING

 

Source: Stalkers… know the signs | Daily Echo 

 

D.G. Kaye ©2015

17 thoughts on “#Internet Safety – Stalkers… know the signs | Daily Echo”

    1. It is Sue. That’s the price we pay when we publicly expose ourselves, but if everyone would learn to take heed, we could avoid unpleasant situations. Thanks for writing the post. 🙂

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    1. For sure Bee. I’ve been meaning to write a post on this and when I came across Sue’s post, she summed it up perfectly. So many aren’t aware of cyber stalkers. 🙂

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      1. Deb, I can honestly say I wasn’t aware of most of what you or Sue wrote about. It’s so good when people raise other’s awareness on such things. Both of you have with me that’s for sure!

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      2. Thanks Bee. It’s always great to share and pass along good info. Many people overlook these things because they feel a certain safety within their own little confines of a chair and a computer; they should be reminded that it’s a big cyber world out there. 🙂

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  3. Happily this is not something I’ve had to deal with, though I’ve heard women besides Sue and you mention it, Debby. (Hopefully I didn’t just jinx myself 😀 ). Sue makes some very good points here. Mega hugs to you both.

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  4. Thanks for sharing Sue’s post – I’m very wary of such approaches but even so, I’ve been caught out a couple of times, just clicking ‘accept’ when I shouldn’t, because I’m in a hurry, or its late and I’m tired… you know how it is.
    Now I make a general rule of never accepting anyone who doesn’t have mutual friends with me, or has writing credentials. The last one I made the mistake of accepting was, surprise, surprise, in the oil industry. Now he really could have been, as he was in Aberdeen, but he was pretty pushy about wanting to meet up, so I gave him he heave ho.
    And tonight I have a request from someone I’ve never heard of, with a child’s avatar.
    Emotionally manipulative bastards.

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    1. Well I’m glad this post served as a good reminder Deb. Most of the ‘friend’ requests I get on google and click on their page have no posts and their about page usually has one sentence, ‘looking for a relationship.’ Don’t be so ‘click happy’, if you’re tired, ignore until you have time to do a check. 🙂

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  5. too true – and it terrifies me that media is a given right now for young people, it worries me that my boy can already use my iPad it won’t be long before he’s screaming for Facebook!

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