The Government is Watching You - on Facebook

Rafael Cohen reports: It turns out Facebook and MySpace aren't only good for catching up with high school classmates. They're good for background checks -- by the government -- as well.
 
According to a report on Foxnews.com, the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI have been using the social networking sites along with Wikipedia, YouTube and Google searches to help gather information about people they're investigating.
 
They are "poring over non-verifiable profiles on the Web to help decide who should be allowed into the country and who may pose a threat to national security," according to the report.

It's not the first time the internet has been used for research on individuals. Officials have used the Web to verify marriages and background information of immigrants and cross-check information about U.S. citizens who purchase one-way plane tickets. And campuses, employers, and local police have been turning to those sites for at least the last few years for additional information on students, potential hires, and suspects.

Individuals have been aware that information about themselves on the internet isn't always within their control -- some have even taken to hiring "reputation management consultants" to help them better shape their online profile.

But social-networking sites may be seen as different from the wide-open internet. Since they tend to be self-selected groups of individuals, they seem like they're more protected -- visible only to those "connected" to a particular profile.
 
The bigger issue is whether the information found on Facebook or MySpace is really all that reliable. There are hundreds if not thousands of phony profiles set up for celebrities -- and no doubt for the occasional non-celebrity as well. So how about this for a new Facebook group: I Got Deported Because of My Facebook Profile and It Wasn't Even Really Mine.