ArticleSnatch Blog

You are browsing the archives of Online Identity.

The U.S. government charged a mother who allegedly used MySpace in a deadly hoax that drove her daughter’s 13-year-old classmate (pictured here) to suicide with conspiracy.

Missouri resident Lori Drew, after her daughter’s schoolgirl fights with neighbor Megan Meier, 13, created a fake MySpace account to pose as a boy and flirt with Meier. When Drew began using her online identity to taunt Meier, the girl hanged herself.

The boy Megan had been corresponding with on MySpace unexpectedly began calling her a fat slut. He wrote “the world would be a better place without you.” It turns out he was a hoax created by the mother of a former friend.

Drew was indicted today for conspiracy and accessing protected computers without authorization to inflict emotional distress. She faces 20 years in prison, the maximum penalty.

“Any adult who uses the internet or a social gathering website to bully or harass another person, particularly a young teenage girl, needs to realize that their actions can have serious consequences,” Los Angeles federal prosecutor Thomas O’Brien, who brought the charges, said in a statement.

The case was filed in California, where MySpace is headquartered.

The suit goes a long way toward establishing and enforcing the boundaries of acceptable and illegal behavior on the Internet in general and social media sites in specific.

There is much that you need to know about online identity theft, and so regardless of your age, sex, or gender, you are going to want to make sure that you are as knowledgeable as possible in regards to the matter of identity theft.What is Online Identity Theft?Online identity theft is something t…
More: continued [...]

Traditionally, a well-polished resume and rock solid interview technique were the standards that job seekers aspired to when venturing out to find new employment. As the Internet has become more of a user-generated medium, however, blog posts and online photo albums send just as important a message to potential employers about your character.
Do you remember [...]