I get that people like using Facebook to see and to post cute pictures of their kids and their family and friends kids, but it’s also vital to know that it’s really not SAFE to post pictures of kids on that platform.
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It’s the same company and it’s all gone downhill, but if you’re careful instagram can still largely just show you people you follow and not a bunch of unwanted “news” (you have to reset the “turn off suggested posts” option every 30 days, but it’s essential).
Yeah, if you want to share pictures of your pets, family, or friends, use Signal or a private group chat, ideally with self-deleting messages. Posting them online for everyone to see is one of the worst things you can do for your safety and privacy.
Imagine calling your local newspaper and saying, "Here’s my address if you want to know where I live or creep on my kid." Are most people rational human beings who wouldn’t misuse that information? Sure. But are there those who would exploit it for their own indulgent desires? Absolutely.
People can absolutely determine the exact location of an image by analyzing lighting, shadows, landmarks, or natural elements in the background. The amount of data needed to identify someone—or even their current location—is shockingly small. Any privacy book worth it's salt explains this.
I recently saw a post from a FB user pushing strongly for a social media ban on kids. I checked their profile. Photos of their kids in school uniform outside their house, their kids’ full names, the user’s job details, mobile number, and email. I didn’t even have to look. Everything was just there
Yep, the ones calling for social media bans are the least informed, yet demand control over what others see. They can't be bothered to understand the tech beyond moving a mouse, but still claim authority over what their children learn. These laws are a hollow power grab disguised as protection.
Everyone’s taking pictures with their phone cameras these days, which by default embed GPS coordinates and other metadata in each image; This is how your phone can automatically arrange photos by where they were taken.
This metadata is very easy to extract from photos uploaded to social media.
I had a moment yesterday where I just automatically pinpointed someone's exact apartment unit in my city because of a pic they posted here. I didn't even do any digging and I don't even live close to there, I just had a "oh! That's this view" and was spot on.
having lived in multiple major cities throughout my life, I've had this moment more times than I'd like. and not just with windows, I once recognized an apartment interior (wood floor type + heater + person's claimed location) because I go really ham on apartment hunting 😭
this, oh my god. i never, ever post about where i am, when i am there - childless woman, often traveling solo. i cannot believe how many people that i know who still tell the internet at large their entire trail, as it’s happening!
I find it hard to freak out too much over the idea of someone deciphering clues to figure out my address when I'm old enough to have lived in a time where my address was just printed out and handed out to everyone who lived in the city. And everyone else could just call a well known # to get it.
It makes me feel old, but it feels sometimes like kids these days have never heard of the phone book. Lol. That said I am very cautious about identifying information in public fora, including outdoor photographs, that can be used to identify and locate me.
Phone books used to be local and limited, from a time when you could get a job without employers needing a phone number. Today, being on social media or having a phone number is almost required; employers will find it "suspicious" if you don't, using it as an excuse not to hire you.
Turns out that King County has their real estate database public enough that I was also able to find my address listed via a 3rd party that has all of my mortgage information.
It sucks that I'm so easily found but it's also liberating in that at least I don't have to stress about it.
eons ago where I lived a company printed a phone book for each suburb. each listed address, phone, husband, wife's name, children's names and ages. can you imagine?
Genuinely, I need you all to stop acting like this has ever been okay. Today, any random person can easily build a detailed profile of you, including your current location (not just your address), with just a quick look at your social media. This is not something we should be okay with.
Simply put, my point is that sharing information online for the world to see is a huge breach of privacy and safety. If you're here to argue about it when you can't even agree that privacy matters, then you're arguing in bad faith. We’re never going to reach a compromise.
It is absolutely known that people who are into child sexual abuse material love taking public photos of kids to use for that purpose, and to edit and photomanipulate.
Also, you don’t want random online creeps to know what your kids look like.
My sister made her dad (not mine) promise not to share pictures of her daughter online. He sent his granddaughter’s pictures to his friends who then tagged her on a facebook photo congratulating her. He still doesn’t understand why she refuses to send him any more.
honestly, it's never been safe to post pictures of your kids on nearly any public platform. folks forget that before instagram and "influencers" most people werent vanity blogging for potential fame. you knew that posting your child's pics released a lot of sensitive identifying info about your kid.
i used to do geoguesser (as a member of Myspace's unpaid moderation team) on profile pictures of kids obviously too young to sign up for Myspace to illustrate how easy it was to track down a child and pretend like I knew their parents or something.
Do people actually post to Facebook? My entire feed is whatever glurge the algorithm thinks I should see, with maybe one out of twenty posts being from somebody I actually follow. All Facebook has going for it is Messenger.
My school will randomly ask permission to use my kids for photo ops in their posts.
I am one of the rare "Hell nos" on that waiver because all it takes is on sicko to think they found their "unicorn" and obsess over my kids into worse danger.
I read that child sex offenders collect innocuous pictures of children, construct fantasies about them, as an early step
Asked a police person who lead an online anti child exploitation team if that was true
"Yep, its true"
It was a sort of TOS isn't being technically violated but I'd see progressives etc get taken down for nearly nothing. I dragged my feet deleting my FB but I honestly think deleting Meta accounts have a higher priority than deleting X accounts. Meta is significantly more dangerous now
A punk group I was in mid 2010s on FB had found several group pages that did nothing but share such photos. Many of us reported them citing what we believed the pages were for and FB moderation did nothing. Some pages were more blatant than others, I think FB knows to some extent imo
When our kids were born we set up a private WordPress blog with password access for family. They get an email notification when we post anything new and can post comments as well. It's worked really well, no need for Facebook for this.
I run Immich on a physical server that's sitting right here next to my desk. It's basically just a self-hosted Google Images kinda thing. I like the idea of having something I'm in control over and, if I want to take it down, I can just shut it down.
Honestly, I'm not sure I'd bother with one of the prebuilt ones unless you averse to some tinkering.
An old PC you've got laying around or even go onto eBay and buy a cheap one from an office liquidator for ~$50-100. Get some refurb'd enterprise drives and try an OS like Unraid or TrueNAS.
I agree. And in addition for me it’s really a matter of consent. I have smart kids, and I ask them if I can when I want to share stuff I about them online. But for photos/names/embarrassing anecdotes/etc I don’t share even with permission because I don’t know if they really can knowingly consent.
My mom was aghast when I didn't want her to repost a picture from my Instagram onto her fb. And when I was like, "I don't want that many people to have access and my ig is locked down and I have few friends there" she clearly thought it was crazy. But she followed my wishes, so
I grew up with so many double standards about it - that my family was free to share whatever the wanted about regardless of my wishes but I was wrong to share anything they they didn't want shared.
Maybe it's my generational perspective on socials, but I lock that $#'t down. FB for me is and was only ever real friends I know (peeps who know my phone number already). I get sketched out sharing photos or real personal deets to ppl I don't know. Always seemed weirdly braggy like "LOOK AT ME!"
I know it wasn’t malicious or anything, but yeah, just a total lack of understanding or awareness. Eventually had an uncomfortable conversation, but she ultimately took it the right way and stopped
i posted earlier that no one is on FB or related in my family but that's because we had a stalker before the internet and weren't even in the phonebook for that reason
it gives a very different perspective on sharing names and pictures on the 'net
I constantly bitch about this but in 2012 I could post thongs and pasties on Instagram. Currently that gets reported immediately if you’re trans and shadow banned if you’re a cis who isn’t a celebrity.
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This metadata is very easy to extract from photos uploaded to social media.
Brains and street view- terrifying.
It sucks that I'm so easily found but it's also liberating in that at least I don't have to stress about it.
I didn't think to have my phone number be unlisted and I've lived in Ihoz Labs long enough to have a landline so...
Also, you don’t want random online creeps to know what your kids look like.
He does this for fun.
Geoguessing is his hobby.
There are tens of thousands of people like him.
And when your kids are tweens make sure their socials are private to within their circle.
End of story.
I stopped posting anything of my kids after a guy who followed me was sent to prison for possession of CSAM.
I am one of the rare "Hell nos" on that waiver because all it takes is on sicko to think they found their "unicorn" and obsess over my kids into worse danger.
Asked a police person who lead an online anti child exploitation team if that was true
"Yep, its true"
The difference being that people choose what to post on their own. Kids don't control what their parents post. So they can't even decide not to.
Print letter & photo on copy paper
Back to basics
An old PC you've got laying around or even go onto eBay and buy a cheap one from an office liquidator for ~$50-100. Get some refurb'd enterprise drives and try an OS like Unraid or TrueNAS.
I bought a low-profile GPU for it as well to do hardware acceleration for video streaming, but I probably didn't even need it.
Buuut, you gotta tinker.
But that was after I purged down to people I know irl and extra locked down my account.
I will miss having a more private social media spot.
I don't even post photos of my girlfriend without her permission and she's 30.
that's terrible
i posted earlier that no one is on FB or related in my family but that's because we had a stalker before the internet and weren't even in the phonebook for that reason
it gives a very different perspective on sharing names and pictures on the 'net