Who needs a private detective when you have Facebook history? A judge in Connecticut ordered a divorcing couple to provide their online dating and Facebook passwords to each others’ lawyers. Awkward.
The female half of the couple had already joined Match and eHarmony, and her husband theorized there was much more to uncover:
[Lawyer Gary] Traystman tells me that his client saw a few incriminating things on the computer he shares with his wife at home that made him suspect that there would be more evidence in her social networking accounts. Traystman says there was evidence there of how she feels about her children and her ability to take care of them, and that it would help his client in arguing for full custody.
The woman in question at first tried to text a friend to delete posts and change passwords during a deposition (sneaky!), but the judge then ordered her to hand them over. But Facebook’s terms of service run counter to that, says Forbes columnist Kashmir Hill:
While all may be “fair” in love and war (and personal injuries), password exchanges like this are not kosher according to Facebook’s terms of service. I wonder if Judge [Kenneth] Shluger is aware that his order violates Facebook’s TOS, which require that users not hand over their passwords to anyone else. Shluger did, at least, try to limit the privacy invasiveness of his order by telling the parties not to prank each other.
It seems to us that pranking each other is the least of this couple’s problems.
[Forbes]
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That’s truly scary. I wouldn’t even want my friends going through my FB history!