The downside of social networking

We’ve all heard about teenagers who, after posting the details of the parties on a social networking site, found that their parties had turn into riots because of crashers who troll networking sites.  It turns out that, at least if you’re an Israeli, party crashers may be the least of your worries:

Israel’s internal intelligence service, Shin Bet, urged the public to exercise caution when using Facebook, saying Arabs are trying to recruit spies on the popular social networking site.

The agency warned Israelis against answering unsolicited messages or sharing telephone numbers and other sensitive information over the Internet. It said there have been numerous incidents recently in which violent groups tried to recruit Israelis through Facebook and other networking sites.

The Shin Bet said Israelis should be wary of seemingly innocent meetings or dates proposed online by people they don’t know. These messages might be posted by militants with intention to kidnap or kill, it said.