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| A screenshot of Orkut.com |
Last weekend, well past midnight, I got a frantic telephone call from a 17-year-old girl. She could barely talk, and kept sobbing for over five minutes. I did not know the girl nor did I know how she got my number. I was patient. She seemed to be in some sort of trouble.
When she finally calmed down she told me that somebody had opened a fake Orkut account in her name, and as a profile picture morphed a photograph of her and someone else’s under-clad body. She was petrified that her parents would see it.
Orkut is the most popular social networking site in India. Every teenager and even a significant number of adults are its members. The site is run by Google and it is named after its creator Orkut Buyukkokten. The initial target market was the United States, but the majority of its users is from Brazil, followed by India.
Unlike other social networking sites like Facebook, My Space and Hi5, Orkut is a little dicey. If you have a Gmail account you automatically qualify for an Orkut account. Otherwise, you can open one with any email address you have.
In this girl’s case someone opened a fake Yahoo account with a very suggestive username and then created a fake profile on Orkut. Obviously, the girl’s name formed part of the suggestive username. I told her to calm down and go to the nearest police station and file an FIR. I assured her that the culprit would be tracked down and jailed. The next morning she did as she was told and our cyber cops are close to tracking down the culprit.
Orkut is a site that is designed terribly. Nobody reads the fine print, and settings where you can restrict any misuse are difficult to find. There are some rules you must follow if you want to maintain privacy on Orkut. There are several privacy breaches that can occur without you even knowing about them.
Girls should be very careful. It is always better not to share your photograph. Even if you do decide to upload one, choose a long shot or one in a group. But no close-ups. Also, never upload your passport-size photo. It might be misused to make a forged passport of someone who might look similar to you.
Your profile with your personal information is available to the public. But some information can be kept private. Never give your complete address. Do not disclose your phone number on Orkut.
Orkut albums are also available to the public, but they can be kept private. If you have uploaded your pictures in these albums you must block strangers from viewing them. I suggest you avoid uploading your images since you cannot be sure if Orkut’s privacy features are really secure.
The Scrapbook is where your friends write for you. This too is available to public viewing. All sorts of nonsense goes on here. Hide your scrapbook from strangers and allow only friends to write in your Scrapbook.
So how do you block others from viewing your stuff? Most kids do not know this and are thus vulnerable. Under your picture in the first column you will find Settings. Click on it. There will be a Privacy tab. Under “Select who is allowed to view my contents” turn everything to “all of my friends.”
If you are ever a victim of a fake profile go to the bottom of the page and click on Safety Centre. This will take you to a Report Abuse wizard. But let me warn you that Google is notoriously slow in acting. Despite this you must report the abuse and then file an FIR.
If someone is impersonating you on Orkut go to this page: http://help.orkut.com/bin/request.py?contact_type=print . Fill in the form, which comprises your name, email address, the name of the fake Orkut profile and several other mandatory fields. Google promises to act in three working days, but here too it takes time.
My advice to you is to dump Orkut and join Facebook or Hi5. They are much more fun and no nonsense goes on there. Parents, too, must keep a watch on their child’s Orkut profile. Believe me, it will prevent any possibility of heartaches in future.
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