Myspace ID theft

[adrian]

from khon.com

The website Myspace.com is a popular place to chat and read posts about anything and everything.

But, a Mililani model says her identity was stolen on the site and police can't help her.

"It was stressful when they said it's a website you can't do anything," says Shanmarie Willis.

Willis felt violated when she logged on to Myspace.com.

"They're using my name, my pictures, talking to people who know me," says Willis.

The former model knew something was up when friends kept saying they'd seen her page.

"I had never been on Myspace so I was a bit concerned," says Willis.

She tracked down several imposter pages, all with foul language and innuendo.

"It was really disturbing because of how they put me out there," says Willis. "The profile they made up was not too pleasing and I looked through the messages and there were actually people I knew."

I think I have a myspace account, but like everything else, I don't post any pics of me or have my real name on it.

Now I better tell my cousin and sister about it because they're myspace users.

[scrivener]

Re: [local news]Myspace ID theft

If your siblings are already MySpace members, what do you have to warn them about?

Whether this is identity theft in the way we're used to thinking about it is questionable. What do the laws say about claiming in privately owned places that you're someone you're not? I know for certain that my students have done AIM chats using my name, but should that be prohibited? Anything questionable the chatters might have said while pretending to be me should be protected by free speech, don't you think? When Will Farrell pretends to be President Bush on Saturday Night Live, is he stealing someone's identity?

The SNL people are safe because no reasonable person expects anything said on the television show to be the truth; in the same way, I don't think any reasonable MySpace user should expect someone claiming to be Shanmarie Willis (whoever she is!) to really be her, especially if certain claims are questionable, as in the "unsure" claim.

It is in MySpace's best interest to remove potentially libelous pages, but it shouldn't be forced or expected to, and Shanmarie (whoever she is) should probably just chill. Nobody here thought "Malia Song" was Malia Song in the John Berger thread 'cause nobody here is that silly.

You wanna know something else? I don't believe Glen Miyashiro is actually the guy Frank DeLima sang about. Something just tells me.

[Glen Miyashiro]

Re: [local news]Myspace ID theft

You wanna know something else? I don't believe Glen Miyashiro is actually the guy Frank DeLima sang about. Something just tells me.

Damn. There goes my credibility.

[adrian]

Re: [local news]Myspace ID theft

If your siblings are already MySpace members, what do you have to warn them about?

Ever since my cousin got a camera phone, she's been putting the pics that she took on her "website". And while I was browsing through the site a few months ago, a few people even posted their cell phone numbers

And don't get me started on the pics some people are posting. Its like a dating service for some people, and some teens lie about their age (if I remember correctly, a 14 year old put her age as 22, when you had to be 16 to join).

When the website craze was at my high school, we just made a page on Geocities and emailed each other. Kids are so spoiled these days.