You can file this one under the "Duh" department.
As it turns out to the surprise of absolutely no one, 1 in 4 Facebook users lies about the personal information they input on their profiles. The reason? It’s stated that it’s privacy concerns, but I’m going to take a wild guess here and say that’s not what it is at all.
What happens when a web site – any web site mind you – asks for personal information, the first question the person signing up for the site asks is very simple. "Why does this site need this information?" More often than not if someone feels they don’t need that site knowing anything about them other than an email address (and sometimes even that information is false and a throw-away address is used), that someone is going to lie their ass off and input nothing but false information.
Here’s a few time-honored traditions when it comes to false information.
Any time you see a phone number of (XXX) 382-5968 where XXX is the area code, you just got flipped the virtual bird, so to speak.
You’d probably not be surprised at how many domains James Kirk owns. Some people even include the middle initial T.
Email addresses for domains like tradermail.info, devnullmail.com, bobmail.info and so on are all throw-away Mailinator domains.
The point is that people outright lying about personal information when submitting personal information to web sites is nothing new. It happens everywhere on the internet. In comments, forums, social media sites, etc.
There is one exception. A person gets really honest really quick if they’re getting paid. I can guarantee you that eBay sellers and PayPal users all have very accurate personal information listed to collect the cash when people pay them for goods and services.
Am I saying getting paid is what makes people honest with personal information on the internet more than anything else? Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying. Money talks.
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