Erika Conner
You open a friendly e-mail from a pal and it says they want to show you photos! But what's really going to happen if you say yes? 7's Hank Phillippi Ryan found: instead of looking at snapshots, you're looking at big trouble! For the scoop on Tagged.com, she's got the 'Real Deal.'
You get an e-mail with a friend's name on it that says... "Want to see the photos?"
You'd say yes, right?
Rosalyn Dreyfus of Chestnut Hill did!
Rosalyn Dreyfus
"It came from someone I knew very well."
Immediately, a website called tagged asked for her e-mail address and her password and signed her as a member. She says she did it for her friend's sake.
Rosalyn Dreyfus
"I just felt she would be disappointed."
Here's the Real Deal, Rosalyn had just entered Tagged.com, a social networking site that experts say has created cyber-havoc across the country.
Hank Phillippi Ryan
"So no one has posted any pictures?"
Robert Siciliano, internet security expert
"Nobody posted any pictures."
The word "tagged" may sound familiar, but it's not like getting "tagged" in Facebook.
And here once you give your email and password, the problem begins.
Robert Siciliano, internet security expert
"They have all of the addresses in your web-based email account, all the addresses in your address book."
Hank Phillippi Ryan
"How can they do that?"
Robert Siciliano, internet security expert
"They can do it because you allowed them to."
Yup, you did. In the terms of service - do you read those? - It says users:
"... Acknowledge and agree that their e-mail addresses and other personal information may be used by tagged for the purpose of initiating commercial e-mail messages."
And once Tagged had your information everyone in your address book got emails saying you're trying to share photos and that's completely false!
But your friends don't know that, so they could be lured into giving their emails, too. The point of course-- if for tagged to snag as many new members as it can.
Rosalyn Dreyfus
"I was shocked."
The CEO of Tagged, Greg Tseng, talked to us by email. He calls Tagged a Social networking site for meeting people.
So we asked, "How do you justify sending people e-mails stating 'click here to see photos' when there are no personal photos?"
Tseng admitted: the photos were actually generic pictures, posted by Tagged.
He said: "...there were in fact photos sent with the invitations, but we recognize that the way they were presented - generic photos not personal photos - caused confusion."
So we asked, "How will you fix this?"
He says: "We are creating a new registration process with extreme focus placed on clarity of wording and minimizing confusion."
But for users like Rosalyn, that new process comes too late.
Tagged.com's CEO says he's issued an apology to anyone who was misled and he admits they've gotten more than 2,000 complaints. He also told me they do not sell or share personal information with any third parties.
(Copyright (c) 2009 Sunbeam Television Corp. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
