James Delahunty
18 Feb 2010 7:06
Dutch developers have set out to prove a point about the safety of certain social networking practices in a very public way. A new website they have constructed - Please Rob Me - lists information about empty homes gathered from Twitter. The site scrutinizes users of Foursquare, which is based on a person's current location in the real world.
"It started with me and a friend looking at our Twitter feeds and seeing more and more Foursquare posts," said Boy Van Amstel, one of PleaseRobMe's developers. "People were checking in at their house, or their girlfriend's or friend's house, and sharing the address - I don't think they were aware of how much they were sharing."
PleaseRobMe.com re-posts tweets from users who have chosen to alert the world of their whereabouts automatically on Twitter, which in turn reveals when they leave their homes. Of course the site does have a brief disclaimer explaining that it is not intended to be used as a tool to aid burglars.
"The website is not a tool for burglary," said Mr Van Amstel. "The point we're getting at is that not long ago it was questionable to share your full name on the internet. We've gone past that point by 1000 miles." He said that the site is basically just a Twitter search tool and nothing new, adding that anyone who can write HTML and a little javascript could create it.