Facebook Friend or Foe?

A few weeks ago I logged onto Facebook to see I had a new message from someone I can only loosely call “friend:” 

Hello, Miss Sales. I was surfing the interwebs and I stumbled across A_Rhythmic_Soul on okc and she looks familiar. If you were to know this young lady, would you ask her out for me? 

Having no idea what “okc” meant, I googled it. Search results turned up links to OkCupid, a free online dating site for 20-somethings. Now, I’m not one for online dating, so when I looked up username “A_Rhythmic_Soul” I was surprised to find, well, me. Someone had taken my profile pictures from Facebook and created an online dating profile. I was shocked and disturbed that someone could so easily assume my identity on the internet. Worried that someone else I knew would stumble upon my pseudo-profile, I spent the morning asking friends to flag the user until they were taken off the site. My boyfriend was most eager to assist. 

After the crisis had passed, I looked through my friend list and realized there were dozens of people I’ve added to my profile over the years that I’ll never see again, that were not and likely never will be a friend. So I upped my privacy settings and unfriended until I tired of clicking. In my opinion, it’s better to share vacation photos with a few close friends rather than find them strewn about the internet.

Suggestion: Login, Home, Privacy Settings. You’ll feel better knowing who’s viewing your Facebook profile, though the online dating world might miss you.