Don't Friend Your Debt Collector on Facebook
Is it really surprising that debt collectors use Facebook to try to contact debtors? They're basically paid to annoy people by any means necessary. Now a woman is suing a debt collection agency for using Facebook to harass her.
Florida resident Melanie Beacham owed $362 in car payments, and debt collection agency MarkOne Financial LLC was tasked with getting the money. So they started calling her up to ten times a day. But they also messaged her and her relatives on Facebook, which sparked a lawsuit from Beacham in August claiming that MarkOne "intentionally harassed and abused the Plaintiff in outrageous format."
Facebook is not keen on becoming the go-to-site for debt collectors looking to shake down deadbeats. (Although, maybe this could be a good third-party app someone could develop. DebtVille.) A spokesperson told the Atlantic's Alexis Madrigal that "Facebook policies prohibit any kind of threatening, intimidating, or hateful contact from one user to another."
Here's a hint: If you owe someone money, just make your Facebook profile private. It's basically the cyber-equivalent of turning off the lights and pretending no-one's home whenever the debt collector comes to your door.