PNP warns of Facebook predators

MANILA, Philippines—Sex predators, stalkers or crooks may be lurking among your Facebook friends.

In the wake of social media-related crimes, the Philippine National Police’s Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) on Wednesday warned the public against trusting online acquaintances and recommended setting their Facebook pages on “friends only” mode.

Chief Superintendent Samuel Pagdilao, the CIDG director, noted an upward trend in computer crimes, particularly identity theft, libel, estafa (fraud), harassment and hacking, for the first half of the year.

Walk-in complaints of computer crimes to the agency from January 1 to June 14 numbered 56, just 26 cases short of the total for the whole of 2010, he said in a briefing on Wednesday.

Of the complaints, Facebook was the social networking site of choice of most of the perpetrators, with six cases each of estafa and libel, three each of harassment and hacking, and five identity theft cases for the first six months. Two complaints for pornography were also registered in that period.

There were also complaints involving personal e-mail (five complaints), the micro-blogging site Twitter and Multiply (one each), and the online auction site Ebay.

Eleven complaints for threat involving cellular phone use were also recorded in the same period, up from the four cases in the whole of last year. On the other hand, only two credit-card fraud cases were recorded in the first six months, compared with six in 2010.

But Pagdilao clarified that the figures covered only the walk-in cases directly reported to the CIDG. He said his office would coordinate with other units to collect data on cybercrimes from the local police.

Many Filipinos now have access to the Internet and social networking sites.

“In terms of Facebook use, we are ranked fifth in the world,” said Senior Supt. Gilbert Sosa, head of the CIDG’s anti-transnational crime division. “In terms of Internet use, we are 17th in the world. Almost 30 percent of our population is connected to the Internet.”

He said his best tip for social media users is to customize the privacy settings of their profiles. During the briefing, he instructed one of his men to demonstrate how to do this.

The recommended setting, Sosa said, is “friends only,” meaning only people they have acknowledged knowing would be able to view their pictures, information and other posts.

Pagdilao said, “Right now, it’s very important to have awareness, and media plays an important role here, in informing people to be very, very careful especially in uploading information about themselves.”

“You know that any information that you upload can be used by everybody for whatever purpose, like, ‘hey this girl is beautiful.’ One may fall in love, become obsessive and start stalking her,” he said.

“You don’t know what it would do to a criminal mind. They may even start kidnapping victims… they can do that because everybody can access the information,” Pagdilao said.

He said there was a need to create laws specifically defining cybercrimes and setting penalties.

Last week, TV director Ricky Rivero, 39, was stabbed more than 10 times by a man he met through Facebook and invited to sleep over in his home. Hans Ivan Ruiz, 22, who was arrested by the police, denied the charge.

On Saturday, Maria Lisa Dominguez, 44, a female call-center employee, was found dead inside her Mandaluyong home Saturday midnight, hog-tied and stabbed all over her body.

Dominguez was reportedly last seen alive with her boyfriend whom she had met on Facebook.