Cyberstalking
I remember some time ago someone I knew tried texting me if I had an instagram or snapchat account multiple times, before sending me an array of their instagram pictures. I didn't care, and I made it clear, but later on I realized that they weren't sharing their social media photos for me. There was an ulterior motive. They want me to have an instagram. They wanted to figure out my life. They wanted to know everything about my life.
Because if they know your instagram then they know your friends. They can know all your circles and where you hangout, and what you are. They can use all this info to then stalk you and harass you. Of course I never really had an instagram.
I ended up never giving them any personal details and I ghosted them. Apparently they had a really bad reaction to it and I learned later on that thet ended up making a bunch of personal Facebook posts about it. I never knew people could be that garbage, but it's whatever.
I learned a very important lesson from all of this, because they never got any personal data from me they could never use that data to control me. If I sent them any personal data they could then use that data to make some gossip harassment post about me. This is generally why I try to stay away from people who use social media to curate their life.
I ended up discovering that there are hundreds of local facebook groups out there dedicated to people who will anonymously post photos of you online for other people to gossip about. And these aren't some small groups either. All combined they make up tens of thousands of people.
Be careful out there, whoever you're reading this. Women are just as bad as men are on this issue.
I knew someone who had to deal with multiple stalkers. One particular one was pretty bad. They would create multiple fake accounts just to pry into their social media. I honestly wish they didn't have social media. Social Media is like candy for stalkers. Better to just not be online. Better to just be anonymous.
I feel like it's extremely important to not share too much data and not rely on texting for having basic conversations. Better to have them IRL instead.
Posting photos of yourself and of your friends online just all feels so weird and freaky to me.
So to deal with all this I will never share anything about my virtual identity to anyone in real life. I want to remain anonymous. I don't want to be seen or heard by anyone. I don't want to be noticed.
I just want to disappear...
One day I'll leave the internet. I swear to god.