It is not uncommon for SmartSecurityPeople.com to discuss social networks and all of the potential pitfalls associated with them. We usually gear our articles toward helping readers learn about putting filters on the information they are disclosing so they don’t fall prey to identity theft or burglary. However, we recently came across a story that shows how the addictive nature of social networking actually worked in favor of someone that recently had their house burglarized.

Apparently, a burglar was in the midst of his crime spree and happened to see a computer located in the bedroom that he was ransacking. Most burglars would have exclaimed “jackpot!” and added the computer to their stolen pile of goods. However, this one exclaimed “Totally Awesome!” and quickly logged into their Facebook account to see what everyone was up to. The question that comes to our mind is did this robber update their Facebook status to something along the lines of  “…Robbing a House…”? If he was a fan of Twitter, we wonder what his tweets would have looked like:

• Just broke in the upstairs window
• Here is a twitpic of the tree I scaled
• Whew.. no alarm and no dogs!
• Lots of cool jewelry in the bedroom
• Hey look a new computer from @bestbuy
• Hmmm.. Does it have internet?
• Might as well check my Facebook…

As the story reads, the end result is that this burglar stole a couple of diamond rings and forgot to log out of their Facebook account before leaving the house. The police were able to quickly track this person down because he lived in the same neighborhood as the victim. He is currently in custody and faces one to ten years of prison for the theft. The good news for him though… Facebook just recently opened it’s membership to the entire U.S. prison population!