According to ‘experts at Legal and General’ in the Mail today, users of social networking sites could face higher insurance premiums as, apparently, burglars ‘shop for victims’.

The report commissioned by Legal and General was headed by ex-theif Michael Fraser, who now works at the BBC for their Beat the Burglar series. Mr Fraser said:

‘There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that burglars are using social networks to identify likely targets.

‘They gain confidence by learning more about them, what they are likely to own and when they are likely to be out of the house.

‘I call it “internet shopping for burglars”. It is incredibly easy to use social networking sites to target people, and then scope out more information on their actual home using other internet sites like Google Street View, all from the comfort of the sofa.’

Where’s the evidence? Is this just a hunch, or even a tip off, by Mr Fraser, or are there actual statistics or court cases specifically mentioning a link between burglaries and social networking sites? In the second part of the Mail’s article they cite a woman who went to Glastonbury festival, posted about it on Facebook and then came home to find she had been burgled:

She now believes the burglars used information and pictures on Facebook and Twitter – which she also used during the festival – in order to target her flat while she was away.

‘Whilst I am careful about who I accept as a friend, some of my friends have up to 600 friends on their sites who could potentially access my page,’ she said.

‘And because I was sending messages to a festival “group”, I did think afterwards that strangers could have seen and known we were out of the house.’

Right, but that’s not definitely true. She’s making a link between her social netoworking and her burglary – but there’s no actual proof that this is why she was burgled. However, the Mail is presenting this as a concrete example to back up Legal and General’s report. If this is the best evidence they could find then they’re on pretty shakey ground.

The article is also claiming that many users post their addresses on Facebook – I know no-one who does this. Whilst I’m wary of using my own anecdotal evidence, I have just looked through many of my Facebook friends profiles and not found a single address. Besides, even if you do put your address on there (which is stupid), if you are sensible enough to edit your privacy settings then only your friends will be able to view your profile. Further still, if you don’t accept anyone’s friend requests on a whim and keep it to people you are still in contact with then this will limit the chance of a tech-savvy burglar finding your details.

The Mail then shows us how little they understand about Twitter:

In an experiment, 100 friend requests were issued to strangers selected at random.

On Twitter, 92 per cent accepted the stranger as a friend, as did 13 per cent of Facebook users, potentially allowing the stranger to learn about that person’s interests, location and movements.

First of all the 13% on Facebook are idiots. However, is the report seriously suggesting that burglars will trawl Facebook trying to add people just on the off chance that they might find some useful information? I’d like to know whether the friend requests were all sent to people in one town or city as that should have been what they did – after all, a burglar in Manchester will hardly be interested in someone from London. On top of this, of that 13%, how many actually put their address details on there? Because this will surely also affect the chances of a burglar using information on the site, potentially diminishing their attempted details-harvest even further. But now, what are they saying about Twitter?

Friend requests? They mean ‘followers’, of course. You can’t put your address details in your profile on Twitter, so the potential burglar would already have to know where you live. If they don’t then it’s highly unlikely you’ll use your 140 character limit to reveal your address. Furthermore, the would-be burglar would have to wait until you updated revealing that you were going away, when you were going, how long for and potentially, where you live. I don’t know any people who block followers they don’t know unless they’re spammers. This is because, unlike Facebook, you aren’t giving away a wealth of personal information.

So, how many people have been burgled because of Twitter? None, of course. Hey, shoot me down if I’m making an unreasonable assumption.

Lastly, are burglars really going to trawl the internet for victims? Will they really use Google street view to plot their crimes, having reaped information from Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, Bebo – whatever? I very much doubt it. Surely, house burglaries are committed by the opportunistic, who may have scouted the property for weaknesses – not the internet for personal information. I could be wrong, but unless I see solid evidence of this happening frequently then I won’t start to worry just yet.

Maybe I’m being cynical, but this whole article rings alarm bells, especially here:

Plans being considered by Legal & General include questioning customers about whether any of their family members belong to any social networking sites.

Hmmm, fleecing people for more money or genuine concern reflected by a rise in premium….