Facebook :

Wichita State University junior Anne Weierich learned the hard way the pitfalls of the popular web site Facebook.com.
Facebook, with 11 million users around the world, has revolutionized the way students socialize by allowing them to post anything about themselves they want others to know.
But it can have unintended consequences.
Last fall, a friend of Weierich used Facebook to announce a party at Weierich’s house. But the friend didn’t tell Weierich, and strangers unexpectedly showed up at the house.
It was an awkward evening, nothing more, Weierich said. It hasn’t scared her away from using Facebook.
“Facebook lets you control the amount of privacy you desire, so I continue to use it with no problems,” she said. “After all, I was not the one who made the ‘public’ event announcement.”
Harvard University student Chris Hughes and two friends created Facebook nearly two years ago to allow students to share more than they could in a traditional school directory.
“The idea was to take an information directory and put it online and give students control over what information they wanted to share with each other,” Hughes said.
It began as a college-only service that students access using their school e-mail accounts. It has expanded to allow high school students to sign up, originally at a college student’s invitation, but now at the invitation of any high schooler who uses the site.
The details that some students post raise security concerns.
Facebook profiles often contain a student’s school, dorm room number, interests, relationship status, photos, event invitations and the names of online groups they belong to with other Facebook users.
The Washington Post reported recently that some Washington-area private schools have prohibited students from using their school e-mail addresses to register on Facebook.
The schools were concerned about more than students’ revealing too much about themselves online to strangers. College recruiters could use Facebook to discover unflattering things about students, potentially hurting the students’ chances of being accepted.
Parry Aftab, director of the web site WiredSafety.com, shares the security concerns to a point.
“The risk isn’t because of the site but because of the way that students are using it,” she said. They’re too quick to post their addresses, phone numbers and photos.
But that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re in danger.
“No one has, to our knowledge in the United States, ever tracked down somebody from a Facebook page to do them harm,” she said. “There is a way to have a profile page and still be safe about it.”
Hughes said the solution is to use common sense.
“There aren’t necessarily those shadowy stalkers that there might be on a large network like MySpace,” he said. “People can trace anything you said to a very real person on Facebook, so there’s no way to hide anything you said.”
That includes hiding from school officials.
A group of students at Kansas State University, for example, were caught violating the school’s honor code last winter when school officials found them sharing course work on Facebook.
Students use Facebook for the typical activities of campus life.
Wichita State freshman Sara Turner uses it to reconnect with old friends.
“I’ve gotten back in touch with people who I haven’t talked to for years and went to elementary school with,” she said.
Marc Langston, a sophomore at the University of Kansas, posts messages for his student political organizations.
“As a student senator I always look at my enemies’ profiles to see who their friends are, and to deepen my understanding of their background,” he said.
But campus life and students can be a little crazy. Some of what’s on their pages could shock parents.
One group of Wichita Southeast High School students calls itself the Southeast Varsity Drinkers. Another group’s name uses an obscenity that refers to sex and the school’s mascot, the Buffalo.
Southeast principal Leroy Parks declined to comment about Facebook. District spokeswoman Susan Arensman said the district can’t control what students do outside of schools.
“There are certain sites that are blocked from the district, but if students are doing this at home, anybody can type anything,” she said. “If they are doing all of this off school grounds, we encourage parents to know what their kids are doing as well.”
Unlike their college counterparts, high school administrators are not able to access Facebook unless a student has invited them to join.
But many high schoolers are just using Facebook to socialize.
“I don’t use it that often, really,” said Caitlin Harper, a senior at East High School. She just delves into Facebook when people leave messages on her “wall,” the spot on a student’s page where friends can post messages.
“There are a lot of questions and contact information on there that reveals a lot of information about you,” she said. “If you think something might happen by putting that information on there, then don’t put it on there.”
Victoria Nguyen, a senior at East High, said she uses Facebook to “check up on old friends … Facebook isn’t as personal as an online journal, so I like it better.”
But her mother, Kathleen Nguyen, was unaware that her daughter uses Facebook.
“I’m kind of concerned because personal information is on it,” Kathleen Nguyen said. “I don’t want anybody to steal her or my personal information.”
Aftab said parents probably don’t need to worry, overall.
“I tell parents not to freak out when they read what kids have written,” she said. “They might talk about being drunk or having wild orgies when they’ve really been home coloring with their 5-year-old brother. It might not be true, but it makes them look cooler.”
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(c) 2006, The Wichita Eagle (Wichita, Kan.).
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.