Creeped out on Flickr

[mom2four]

About a week ago, someone added me as a contact and marked me as friend and family. So I went to look at their stream trying to figure out who it was. They only had two photos in their stream (of people I did not recognize) so I thought maybe they had a private stream and added them as a contact (and only a contact). Nope, still only two photos. Because of the person's user name, the content of their photo stream, the fact that I think their thumbnail is a photo of a celebrity, I felt a little wary. But I still didn't think too much about it.

Well, I got a message today that's making me think about it a lot now:

Hello! My name is Barbara and I am passionate about children. Their are perfect and I would like to know if you do not have more pictures and send them to me. If so, please post them to your flickr and blocks the foso to see just a FAMILY, and add me as a family Thank you.

At this point alarm bells are going off like crazy in my head so I immediately went and changed the privacy settings for any photos of my kids. I don't want to defame a person but I'm going to put a link to this person's photo stream so that you can see everything I'm seeing - the choice of user name, the thumbnail (which I think is a photo of Ashley Tisdale), the two photos in the stream, with one of them allegedly being this person. Flickr: Perfect Childrens' Photostream It's just not adding up to me.

I'm feeling SO creeped out! It makes me want to go password protect my blog too. ARGHHHH!!!

My privacy settings for any photos of kids that I've uploaded are now changed to Friends and Family (though I think they're still viewable to any members of a group that I've submitted photos to, right?) and that's how I'll keep it in the future. Also, I had joined two other 365 groups but I think I may remove myself from those and just stick to just the DD one.

Am I being overly paranoid or does any one else think this looks fishy?? I almost feel like I should report it to Flickr.

Heather (aka Hezro on Flickr)

[mom2four]

Oh yeah, and after I got the message, I went to look at their contacts and every one I looked at had tons of pictures of kids.

As my husband said, it *could* be just some nice lady who likes kids but then why the fake thumbnail? Why not give Flickr your real name?

[kaleidoscope]

Don't trust people online. I don't post photos of my kids, even as babies. I blur out faces. I don't necessarily blur it so it's completely blotted, but enough so you can't fully make them out so it's not worth a perv's time.

[kaleidoscope]

Ok, I read this to dh and he said Flickr has become the #1 site for stolen photos.

[Jen D]

There are settings on Flickr to protect your photos. I believe there is a thread around here that takes you step by step through the process. Just protect yourself and don't let the bad apples ruin a really good site.

[mom2four]

I changed my privacy settings so that only friends and family can see photos of my kids. i'll have to go add the DD people as friends.

[kaleidoscope]

I would take the pics of kids out. Or blur faces if you want to share anything else that's in the pic. As dh said, people hack into gov't and secure banking sites, do you really think your photos are safe from some pervert?

[ajfetzer]

I have all of my photos set to Friends and family and then I add my Photos of the day to the DD flickr site so they can be viewed there. It works just fine. I am a bit paranoid as well and I think it is good to be!

[katrinak]

when you share the photos with our group Heather, it will allow us to see them. No need to add us as friends.

[susiecw]

All my photos are posted so anyone can see them, EXCEPT for my grandkids...just friends and family. Is that enough?

[susiecw]

Stolen photos? Do we need to put watermarks on our photos? I find them distracting, but... Don't mean to hijack this thread, but just wondering.

[mom2four]

Yeah, that's what I thought Katrina.

My Flickr Contact MO has been to just check the "Friends and Family" boxes for people that are Friends and Family in RL. And then just the generic "contact" is almost like a bookmark so I can easily check out that person's stream. I've got some pro photogs added as contacts and their streams are AMAZING!!!

[mom2four]

Susie, I know, I feel paranoid about that too!!! I don't want anyone stealing my photos!

[susiecw]

I've had several people add me as a contact after commenting on a still life of mine. I've always checked out their photostream before accepting. They've all been amazing photographers.

[Jen D]

Originally Posted by susiecw

I've had several people add me as a contact after commenting on a still life of mine. I've always checked out their photostream before accepting. They've all been amazing photographers.

You can actually go into the settings and add safety measures so people are unable to right click and save to their computer.

[kaleidoscope]

But that doesn't disable a screen shot.

[shellb]

I would definitely make it so anyone you don't know can't see your children.I don't have kids but sometimes I see photos (no one in the DD group) and I think "should they be sharing there kids like that?" I think certain photos elicit creeps to the community and ruin it for everyone. Like I said...I don't have kids but I would assume they are the most important thing in a parents life and you shouldn't risk their well being on someone you don't know.

We sometimes tend to be too good natured but in these situations it's ok to be "rude" and ignore someone. Even if it was a little old lady she should know better. You did the right thing, don't feel bad.

[kaleidoscope]

Originally Posted by shellb

I would definitely make it so anyone you don't know can't see your children.I don't have kids but sometimes I see photos (no one in the DD group) and I think "should they be sharing there kids like that?"

I can't believe that some people post shots of their babies/toddlers with little to nothing on. Whether it's a photo or part of a LO they did. Your baby's tush should not be out on the world wide web.

[Jen D]

Originally Posted by kaleidoscope

But that doesn't disable a screen shot.

A screen shot is extremely poor quality. I guess it depends one you.

[kaleidoscope]

It makes no difference when viewing on your computer. WHen they seize the computers of perverts, there's usually TONS of stuff on there.

[kaleidoscope]

Here's a quick example.
I just took this screen shot. Cropped out most of it, then enlarged it by about 150 pixels. No, it might not be good print photo quality, but are you seeing what I'm trying to point out?

[mom2four]

I think there are two different discussions going on. One is about protecting your children, and one is about protecting your photos. For protecting your photos in general, I'm with Jen - if someone wants to "steal" a screenshot, so be it.

As for protecting your children, that's a different matter. You don't want people seeing those photos at all, as I believe Kaleidoscope is advocating. In general I'm not a paranoid person. I'm comfortable with the precautions Flickr has in place - as long as you avail yourself of them. Sure, there are computer geniuses out there who could hack the site but I think the odds of some computer genius choosing to hack Flickr for my kids photos are pretty low. So for myself, now that I've changed my settings a little, I feel okay. And I like the precautions the admins are taking with DD group site.

I mean, honestly, I just think it's a shame. I just wanted to share photos with friends and let them download pictures of their kids that I had taken. But I no longer feel comfortable with leaving the photos public. Such is life. Better safe than sorry.

[conorsmum]

Thanks Mom2Four for this. I have reviewed my Flickr too so that specific photos of my children are only listed as Friends and Family. It is a shame.

[katrinak]

I think each of us need to decide on our own personal comfort with putting information out on the web. There are permissions and privacy settings you can choose.

Watermarking is also a personal choice.

There is no one best answer. It really depends on your comfort level.

[mom2four]

The funny thing is that after I had this little freak out moment, and I changed my privacy settings on Flickr in a panic, I put a link to a set during Katrina's chat and then no one could see the photos because I had changed the privacy settings. I couldn't figure out why everyone kept commenting on two of the obscure photos of the set. *haha* Well, it's because every other photo had pictures of kids and they were no longer visible to anyone. So there you go. Proof that the Flickr settings do work.

And while I'm wandering off topic, thank you to Katrina for pointing out to me that it was probably my metering that was causing my photos to be completely blown out when I tried to overexpose one stop in snow. My camera was set to matrix metering (which I think means the camera takes multiple readings to determine the exposure) so that explains why I was not having the typical gray snow issue. I had *just* read that tip about overexposing one stop in a book, so I tried it, and then was completely mystified it completely blew out everything. I started to think it was a typo in the book. *hehe* So then when it came up in the chat I was like, "What the heck?! Again, the pros are saying you should overexpose one stop."

[esther_a]

You can disable right click but I think people can always view the source code of the page (which has the link to the image) or save the web page to their computer and the image will be saved with it.
I moved all my kid photos to view only by family and friends after one of my daughter's photos was favorited by a foot fetisher. Creeped me out!!

[kaleidoscope]

Better an ounce of prevention than a pound of cure.