17 High School Students' Facebook Photos Used On Porn Site (VIDEO)

Seventeen students from the Bay Path Technical Vocational Regional High School in Charlton, Ma., are shocked after finding out that their Facebook photos and personal information had been used on a porn website, the New England Cable News reports.

Although police documentation states that all the girls were fully clothed, the network reports the find is still "very unnerving" for the students.

According to the report, Dean of Students Mary Jane Rickson called in each of the girls to tell them what happened.

"This was probably one of the most uncomfortable conversations I've ever had to have," Rickson told NECN. "Especially with telling some of the girls who didn't know that they were on the actual website. They were very upset."

WBZ-TV’s Christina Hager spoke to one of the victims, McKenna Daniels, who expressed her shock when she found out from a friend that her photo had been posted.

"The fact that someone could do that, I don’t understand why someone would do that to me,” the student told Hager.

Police told WCBV-TV that this case isn't the only one in the region. Students, he said, should be wary of what they put online and practice security safeguards like changing passwords often and not accepting friend requests from people they don't know.

Comments

[botticelli51]

01:35 AM on 02/17/2012

There are no "privacy settings" that I'm aware of for public profile pictures. If there is no chance of finding a suspect, or lessening the chance of this happening again, the media and law enforcement may be contributing to the problem by publicizing this story. I bet nobody in these girls' social circles (the victims included) would've ever seen the doctored photos had their interest not been piqued by the fabricated attention.

[acumenguy]

12:42 AM on 02/17/2012

You put it out on social media ....
You lose control.

Are we surprised by this?

[rdschuler]

09:31 PM on 02/16/2012

A photo on facebook is like a diamond . Both photos and diamonds are forever .What you do today ,may haunt you for the rest of your life ,if someone is twisted in their minds to make it happen .

[Ayla87]

03:13 PM on 02/16/2012

Wow talk about irony. There was an article on cracked.com yesterday titled '6 Terrifying user agreements you've probably signed." One of them was basically social media and photo sharing sites reserve the right to sell your photo to advertisers to use as stock images.

Now, whether or not that's actually what happened here I can't say. But it doesn't sound like that much of a stretch in the future, that adult entertainment sites could purchase photos for advertisements or worse: have them shopped into suggestive situations.

[JonnyTruant]

03:45 PM on 02/16/2012

Coincidence, not irony. Sorry for the trolling.

Sadly, these sharing sites are more concerned about making a profit than providing a service. I think it might drive more and more of them to this method for making money. I'm careful where I post my more valuable art and photography. But when it comes to sites like facebook, et al. it's all a roll of the dice.

[iera]

02:20 PM on 02/16/2012

Sorry to say this but it IS the students fault.

If you don't want your facebook picture or information used without your permission do not allow access to pictures / information of any kind to people who are not your direct facebook friends. On top of that, make sure your facebook friends are people you know, not randoms you're never going to meet or have any real connection to.

It's called personal responsibility.

Social networking like everything else in the world has it's pros and cons. If you don't want to fall victim to the cons then make sure you know what you're doing and take the time to learn how to protect yourself as best you can. People should not be blindly relying on the companies who provide these services to protect them from all potential threats, it's just not realistic or possible. Facebook for example has been doing a great job updating and evolving their privacy policies to meet demands of users and security threats but at the same time, it's not Facebooks fault that an individual didn't protect their photos and now they are on a porn site.

As far as kids go, it's called parenting, the internet will not do it for you, you lazy worthless breeding jerkoffs.

[Sam Debater]

10:18 PM on 02/16/2012

When someone enters a house and steals, it is not the fault of the property owner that someone stole from him. You are blaming the victim and using the excuse that because the victim did not take some precaution that you think he should have taken, this is his fault. No, a thief is fully responsible for his actions. Stealing other people's property, including photos, for personal gain is punishable by law.

[Jubik10]

01:08 AM on 02/17/2012

No, internet world is different. It all depends on what the user agreement that we sign before joining any website says. (That the majority of us skip through including myself 98% of the time). If the agreement states that they own anything you post on that website and they can do whatever they want, then its the student's fault for agreeing to it or not reading the terms before signing it. As another person posted earlier, many sites that we join and agree to give permission to have the right to sell our photos as stock photos to other sites. We just don't realize it half the time because we don't usually ever read the terms. We just click through.

[iera]

06:59 PM on 02/24/2012

First of all the thief did not hack the victims computers or phones to gain access to their photos. The photos were taken from public domain. The only illegal activity is posting a minors photo on a porn site without their permission.

That being said, I wasn't saying that the person responsible for taking and posting the pictures on a porn site shouldn't be held accountable. What I'm saying is if you don't want to be the victim you need to properly protect yourself from these types of predators.

If anyone leaves their personal information / photos available for predators to take advantage of that's fine with me but don't cry out as a poor unknowing victim. Online privacy has been a MASSIVE and important issue for almost 10 years.

Facebook pushes security and privacy on it's users on a regular basis. If these girls didn't take it seriously, they will now. If you think being young should excuse them from properly protecting their account, I can understand that, but that leads to the parents, they are just as responsible.

[Llib Noswad]

12:57 PM on 02/16/2012

It would be interesting to find out how this was discovered.

[Serina23]

11:59 AM on 02/16/2012

sauce?

[Sofia Champion]

10:02 AM on 02/16/2012

People in the comments here are blaming the kids for using social networking websites, rather than the POS who did this for being a perverted sociopath. Huh. I don't think their anger is directed at the right person.

[IfIonlyknew]

04:44 PM on 02/16/2012

It is the students Fault, When they fail a test it is their fault......They failed the security test.
Next time they will know what is common knowledge.Why would you think that YOU own the internet.

[Sam Debater]

10:20 PM on 02/16/2012

You make theft sound so noble; "It's a security test." No, it's theft, and the company that does it should be sued, and that's before the matter of criminal libel for associating the children's photos with a porn site.

[barbara jay]

10:02 AM on 02/17/2012

These security issues are trickier than you admit. Even if you know you have to protect your privacy, which is the only part of this that's common knowledge, it's not always clear how to do it effectively. You say "when they fail a test it is their fault . . " but perhaps they were never offered the course in which they were to be tested. I mean that metaphorically but also literally. My child is taking an IT course in school for the first time, and I doubt that the curriculum includes enough about on-line safety to really protect them.

[lemealone]

10:28 PM on 02/16/2012

kids are posting pictures the pervs are interested in. That isn't good either.

[Sofia Champion]

10:40 PM on 02/16/2012

How do we know what those pictures were? I've had people leave terrible comments on just mundane pictures of my face before. I've had people make comments about my breasts on videos I posted as a twelve-year-old when I was wearing long pants and a loose hoodie.

[kayyy]

10:01 AM on 02/16/2012

Tweeting messed up the Huff for several days. Face book has messed up people's lives with there willing help. When are you people going to get a clue? Access your comments history lately? That's the type of histories that can be used againist you in a court of law. I like the Huff but I make it apoint to be uber careful. I don't tweet or use facebook. There's no filter system on them. Here my email is set to the other one and not openly released to everyone.

[trotinboot7]

09:59 AM on 02/16/2012

What we need is more goverment regulation. Lets make it illegel for anyone under 21 to have a facebook account, Never let a crisis go to waste. The scary thing is someone will agree with this

[tamthebrat1978]

10:43 AM on 02/16/2012

I just find it odd they can detect all this stuff for people under the age of 21, yet people hack into bank accounts, email accounts, charge card accounts, yet no legal action is taken. I see how it is, post a picture and go to jail, but steal tons of money and you will be free.

[critiqueyouall]

01:02 PM on 02/16/2012

I would rather lose my house than find one of my kids' pictures on a porn site. I'm sure most people would agree that protecting under-aged girls from perverts is a lot more urgent than protecting your wallet.

[Sam Debater]

10:22 PM on 02/16/2012

You are exaggerating. Police do find and prosecute many people for bank and wire fraud every year. I've seen it happen. Regardless, only a small fraction of all thefts are punished, regardless of what is stolen.

[kayyy]

09:52 AM on 02/16/2012

What I'm discovering from all the comments posted here is everyone knows to be careful and just doen't give a damn.

Bad I guess when the damage hits each individual in the liability, then you'll care enough to boycott or stop using open forms of social media including FB. Sigh...

[kayyy]

09:41 AM on 02/16/2012

Say five people have there pic taken at a party. One of the people is you. Another one of the people post a copy of the pic on the net. It's FB property now you can do nothing about your image being used to break the law set up international scams or anything else.

It's not illegal to use the images from public cameras / suveillance records either. If It's taking a image of you walking down public street your going to end up on the net. Photoshop can turn your image into anything. Have you ever heard of Terrigen? It's away of painting realistic images from any base image. It's usally used to make sci fi scenery some times not.
PROTECT YOUR LIFE PROPERTY ANYWAY YOU CAN.

[Sam Debater]

10:26 PM on 02/16/2012

No, FB does not own your images. Their terms of agreement specifically state that they are licensing your photo from you, not that they are gaining ownership.

A person who is in public has no reasonable expectation of privacy, but they are still protected from slanderous association. That means that just because you are photographed in public does not mean that someone has the right to make it look like you are engaged in behavior that would falsely damage your reputation.

[rkhbit]

09:36 AM on 02/16/2012

Stop using facebook, or at least stop giving out info on facebook. Problem solved.

[SimianNation]

09:35 AM on 02/16/2012

People give away everything about themselves, and then when it gets used in a fashion which they do not appreciate, they cry foul. FB is nothing more than a modern day cow pasture.

I have no sympathy!

[zmg88]

09:34 AM on 02/16/2012

So....who discovered this?

[DA5050]

09:44 AM on 02/16/2012

Hahahah That was first thought,! I bet you won't hear about that