Dear Facebook Friends. I’m out – please rob me.

Last February we got a call out to secure a property that had been burgled in Essondon. The occupants had gone away late Friday night, arrived back Monday morning to find their house pretty much emptied.  Someone had arrived at their house Saturday morning with what APPEARED to be a delivery of a new home entertainment system.  They carried the new boxes of equipment in and carried what looked like old items back to their truck and drove off.  Some of the neighbors even chatted with one of the delivery guys about brands and models.

The only problem was… it was a burglary.  The delivered boxes were empty the delivery/installation  guys were simply emptying the house of its valuable electrical items.  The delivery van was a cover.

Such an event required planning and knowledge that the occupants were going to be away for the weekend.  How could they know?

No way to tell for sure but perhaps through Facebook? Just this week:-

1. I have had 2 people from school who I was not friends with try and add me as a friend on Facebook.  We were not close at school, no reason to think the time apart has brought us closer together.  Turns out both of these guys have since done time.  I declined to add them as Facebook friends.
2. I had one person add me as a friend using a name from someone in my yearbook.  They had added lots of people from school as friends and many had accepted these friendship requests.  Me?  I was a bit cautious.  I had not known this person well at school, they had loaded no recent photos(just photos from the yearbook that were on other peoples’ pages) and I was suspicious as to who this person might in fact be.  When I made some enquiries of them – they blocked me.

   Perhaps it was just someone from school, of it might have been someone simply trying to track me, to find out when my house might be an easy target and rob me.(Not such an easy task mind you…. Robbing a locksmith’s home J)

Do you use a Facebook app that updates where you are?  Sounds like fun right?. But its also almost an invitation to a dishonest person that your belonging are home alone whilst you are out.  Use caution when using such apps.

Home security is more than making sure your home is locked up tight – it’s having taking a few precautions with who you announce your holiday plans to…. and that means being a little bit conscious of who you are adding as a friend on Facebook.