These days, an increasing number of criminals have begun using social media websites to target their next victims. By figuring a person is out of town or otherwise away from home, burglars are taking advantage of opportunities to break into unsuspecting social media users' homes. And a person doesn't even have to be gone long; according to TheBlaze.com, the average burglar is in and out of a home within 10 minutes.

I myself was recently a victim of a burglary. I was only gone for about two hours, but that’s all it took for thieves to break in the back door and rob my house. They took TVs, jewelry and almost took my laptop. Luckily, it was password protected, so they didn’t want it. While it's true, the criminals in my case might have just been opportunistic by waiting and watching for me to leave, social media has become a way for criminals to spy on their targets digitally.

A Social Experiment

To demonstrate just how easy it can be to find out personal information about a person based on what they publicly post on a social media page, a show host recently carried out an interesting social experiment, as seen on one of the IAPP’s previous blog posts. The host visited popular locations, used social media to search public posts of people nearby, and then approached these people, addressing them by name and mentioning other personal information. While this information was not used to harm individuals, the point the host set out to make is an important one: What a person posts online can put their privacy and property in jeopardy.

Privacy and Surprise Minimization

Recently, there has been increasing support for surprise minimization among Internet security and privacy regulators. More and more, people are beginning to call for those who run Facebook and Twitter to go beyond simply posting an updated privacy policy to actually giving users more control over their privacy settings. As users recognize and understand how to change their settings to better protect their privacy, they can be in better shape to avoid becoming victims. In order to do so, it’s essential to explore what options are available and the ways in which today's most popular social networking sites determine a user's location.

Facebook

Still the most popular social media site, Facebook uses a combination of IP address tracking and voluntary user information to track location. Each time a person logs into the Facebook platform from a different computer or device, a unique IP address is transmitted. All IP addresses are location-based, so it's not difficult to tell from where a person is logging in.

However, Facebook also uses voluntary user information such as "check-ins" at various locations to hone in on location tracking even further. Many use these features to show their online friends they’ve visited a particular site while on vacation, which leaves their homes prime targets for burglars. Additionally, Facebook can save your information on a public computer, and with the amount of information the platform asks for, the wrong person may suddenly have access to a lot of personal information, including shopping sites that are “linked” to a user’s Facebook account.

Instagram

The image-driven social media site known as Instagram uses a system of "geo tags" to track a user's location. When this setting is enabled in a user's account, it automatically captures not only the photos themselves but also the GPS coordinates where they were taken. These coordinates can then be seen by other users on a map.

Again, this feature is often used during travel to mark significant destinations. Fortunately, Instagram can only be used to its full extent as a phone or tablet app, meaning that if a phone is password-protected, no one is logging into that account. Furthermore, the only personal information linked to the account is through other social networking sites. Users can easily capture images and post them without turning on the “Add to photo map” feature, and someone looking to break into their homes would have to guess whether or not the person was at that location presently or posting the image later on.

FourSquare

The popular FourSquare platform is built upon knowing its users’ locations. Specifically, FourSquare users grant the system, upon registering for an account, access to the GPS devices on their smartphones. In this sense, there is no need for tracking of an IP address. From there, users “check in” as they visit various establishments and landmarks.

It goes without saying that this app can be dangerous. Not only are users sharing their exact location with followers, but also, there is no option that makes a profile completely private. The closest option to this is to change the user settings so that the username is not visible on a public list of people “checked in” at any location. However, part of the fun of using the app is checking in with friends and receiving deals and “mayorships” for checking in at one place often; if users becomes “private,” these aren’t options they have. This app can easily be used to determine where users are at any given time, especially if they’re being targeted.

Social media sites these days track users' locations in a number of ways, and those who aren't familiar with privacy settings or how to adjust them could end up being at risk for cyber-crimes and physical crimes, such as home burglary. By understanding location tracking on social media sites and becoming familiar with privacy settings, professionals can do their part to help prevent misuse of this information.