Archive - February, 2010

Divorces From Social Media Sites Like Facebook on the Rise

February 23, 2010 in Facebook Divorce with 28 Comments

Facebook has become one of the most popular social networking sites used by individuals all over the globe. Facebook is a great host for people who want to connect with friends, meet new people or even do business with. However, Facebook is also associated with a lot of relationship issues such as breakups and third-parties.

Statistics from illicitencounters.com and other legal studies show that divorce and Facebook are significantly correlated with increased flirting and illicit online affairs. In a study conducted by a law firm, out of 5,436 divorce cases a total of up to 1,087 cases cited that illicit affairs started with the social networking site Facebook.

The Facebook networking site offers great communication features such as instant chat capabilities and easy friend adding system. One can virtually meet new people from the site all over the world. Facebook is also an avenue for meeting Ex-boyfriends or Ex-girlfriends where passion is likely to be rekindled due to their meeting on Facebook.

People flirt on Facebook generally by going online and trying to chat with people to make friends and eventually see each other for a date. Cheating occurs on Facebook all the time as you can see how engaged and even married guys view and flirt through comments on other women’s wall or pictures. A recent study has in fact shown that 60% of surveyed individuals find Facebook photos a good evidence for divorce cases.

The cheating behavior starts with a simple poke, a simple message, wall post, like sign and even an add request. Cheating on Facebook can be simply done, based on the story of one of my friends. People constantly find each other on Facebook and chances of getting attracted to other people’s profiles significantly increase. Thus lots of men and women find suitable undercover lovers in Facebook where they can communicate behind their partner’s back.

Through codes and passwords in Facebook, both cheating parties can hide their actions from their partners. Beware when your partner suddenly stays too long at school, at work or becomes mysteriously busy without verifiable explanation. Also check out the Facebook account of your partner regularly and watch out for hidden messages that may be posted on his wall or picture comments because this might give you a clue.

Facebook Divorce – The Power to Destroy

February 14, 2010 in Facebook Divorce, Featured with 11 Comments

The line between private and public has always been thin. Now, it seems like it is fast disappearing. Social media websites including Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, and blogs are increasingly infringing on people’s private lives. They usually air their dirty laundry by choice but in certain cases, they are the unwitting victims. Take the example of Facebook. How will you react when your wife talks about the intimate details of your marriage and its problems among her “friends” in the social network?

Lauren’s Facebook Divorce Case

This is exactly what Lauren, a 36-year old homemaker from Austin, did to the consternation of her private husband. She documented every stage of her divorce and what she was feeling from it. Among the things she wrote include, “Lauren would cry, but then he wins” and “My house is a mess. My life is a mess.”

While some of the statements she made may refer to her husband, it doesn’t help that in his grief-stricken mind, he would assume that every negative thing Lauren writes is about him. So the divorce proceeded and the grief became almost unbearable for both of them. He also told her that he intended to “un-friend” her on the social site.

Impact of Social Networking

Most know about the positive benefits social networking sites bring in terms of hooking people up, letting long-lost friends find each other, and enabling people from different cultures to interact in a neural setting. But what they fail to pinpoint is its capability to destroy lives and relationships. The extent of its impact depends on your individual tolerance of recriminations, argument, and teary confessions.

Even if you’re publicity shy though, don’t kid yourself. Even the richest and most powerful people are not immune to its power to destroy. A simple example is how the ex-girlfriend of Prince Harry embarrassed him by simply ending her public status in Facebook to “single.” It was quick and it was to the point. For people who have a long history though, the wounds this will leave behind will take a long time to heal.

New Legal Frontier

The damage that Facebook and other social networking sites are doing to personal lives is still up for legal debate. Divorce lawyers see it as a gold mind because they can gain snippets of information from their opponent easily. Currently, there are no binding precepts, contracts, or principles regarding its usage.

The bizarre fact is, if you divorce yourself in Facebook, it is probably going to be more public than the actual one. This is because it can potentially have thousands of witnesses who saw that the relationship has run its course.

Facebook Being Used for Divorce Evidence

February 12, 2010 in Facebook Divorce, Featured with 4 Comments

People are cheating on their spouses using Facebook and more divorce lawyers are returning to the scene of the crime for evidence, the New York Post reports.

A whopping 81 per cent of matrimonial lawyers say that in the past five years they have seen a massive spike in the use of social-networking information as evidence of infidelity, a new poll shows.

The most widely used cyber-evidence “including messages to lovers and incriminating photos” is found on Facebook, the survey from the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers reveals.

“Every client I’ve seen in the last six months had a Facebook page,” said the group’s vice-president, Ken Altshuler, “and the first piece of advice I give them is to terminate their page immediately.”

Sixty-six per cent of those surveyed said they would used Facebook postings as evidence, with 15 per cent from MySpace and 5 per cent from Twitter.

Wall of evidence on Facebook

Mr. Altshuler said he has had three cases in the past six months where Facebook postings were a key piece of evidence.

In one case, he was representing a woman getting divorced from her alcoholic husband and also seeking custody of their kids. the man had told the judge he had found God and had not had a drink in months.

The claim was exposed as bogus thanks to Facebook pictures of the man partying at a friend’s house three weeks before the court hearing.

“The friend had a picture of him holding a beer in each hand with a joint in his mouth,” Mr. Altshuler said, leading the judge to question the man’s credibility.

He also cited another recent custody case where his client’s ex-wife had claimed she was engaged and set to be married in a bid to show how stable her household was.

That was called into question by the woman’s Facebook posting where she wrote, “she had broken up with her abusive boyfriend and that if anybody had a rich friend to let her know.”

“Don’t do anything because you don’t know who’s looking. A good attorney can have a field day with this information,” Mr. Altshuler said.

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