Warning: Avoid publicly posting anything on line you wouldn't want either your mom, a current or future prospective employer, or an investigator to read!
Think I'm kidding? Read Mr. Stratton's blog post below. People often casually post on these social media sites without ever considering that what goes online may stay on line. Forever.
That means that not only may your friends and family can read all you have to say, but possibly so may everyone else, including prospective employers, and insurance providers. And not just yours.
If any litigation should arise, at any point in the future, you can bet your bottom dollar the insurance company for the other side will have their investigators checking out the social media sites real quick. And they have every right to do it too. It's perfectly legal.
Oh, I would never commit any kind of fraud, you say? Doesn't matter. Part of any good investigation involves not only looking for any evidence of fraud or wrongdoing, but also encompasses investigating the normal character of the person (s) they are investigating.
Is he a stable person, with long term employment, good credit, long term residence, and is well-liked by friends and neighbors? Or does he/she bounce around from job to job, have terrible credit, doesn't know his neighbors well, or doesn't get along with them?
Does he/she get on a social network, ranting and raving, and getting into disputes with co-workers, or former husbands or girlfriends? Does he/she participate in on line bullying? Does he/she have a mouth like a sewer? Does he/she have young kids who post on line too?
What do investigators look for? Why they look for people to just yak away uninhibited. It's amazing the kind of information which can be gleaned from such ramblings. Suffice it to say, it's really not a good idea to be bragging about your latest bowling scores online if you're out on disability. Those are the kind of things that tend to get noticed.
Investigators are taught, or should be, speech and behavioral analysis. This would include listening to and watching us talk, observing our body language, and reading anything we write down. When we speak, or write, in an uninhibited way, we give away far more than we realize about ourselves.
And what we write online can reflect negatively on us with people like future prospective employers, health insurance companies, or insurance companies investigating claims.
January 29, 2011
"LA Times published an article about how insurers are searching social networking sites to uncover fraud. (Hat tip to the Kaiser Health News Network). This is a common enough theme these days, but what is different is that some insurers supposedly are actually making claims decisions based on what they find on social media like Facebook or Myspace. I'm wondering if insurers subscribe to social medial search services, such as Spokeo. I find it hard to believe that claims adjusters are separately visiting each social media website to run a variety of searches."
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UNAND's REPOSITORY
Posted by: handout | February 07, 2011 at 03:44 AM
Not surprised, it makes sense. Heck, I wish Facebook had been around when my dad was sued because of a car accident (the other driver claimed he couldn't walk or work for over a year afterwards due to back problems). My dad ended up having to look up where this guy lived, and went there with a video camera. He documented the guy putting up a new wooden fence in his yard, all by himself, swinging a mallet.
It might not have taken so long to catch him in the act if we could have just caught him on FB.
Posted by: Rebecca C | February 08, 2011 at 07:07 PM