I am writing to you Sam for help this week "my friend" had began asking me for very strange requests such as send me selfies and "she" wanted to know what school i attended furthermore she began to make me feel extremely uncomfortable as i had not met "Kayleigh" yet.
i am now glad i did not
Although now im given her my phone number so she is harrasing me
Sam
Hi there,
People you meet online aren’t always who they say they are. So it can be hard to know who you can trust, especially if you don’t know them in person.
When you start feeling uncomfortable about what someone says or things they ask you to do, it’s usually a sign that something isn’t right. Trust your instincts when you feel suspicious and don’t do something you feel unhappy about or that you might regret later.
Anyone can make an account on social media and pretend to be someone else. No-one checks to see if someone is who they say they are, so there’s no reason to believe someone’s telling the truth. It’s important to stay safe and not share things like your phone number or your email address. You should never share your home address or any information that could help someone to find you in person.
On social media, it’s possible to stop someone from contacting you again by blocking them. You’ll also have the option to report them. Look at the help section of the app or site if you’re not sure how to do this. And, if you’ve shared your phone number it’s possible to block someone from contacting you on the phone again. Usually you’ll find the option to block them in your contacts list or on a recent contact from them. Think carefully about what information you have on your social media profiles as well as who can see your profile and what you post. For example you could set your privacy to ‘friends only’.
Remember, you might be able to block a phone number or block someone from contacting you on social media but other types of information can’t be unshared once you’ve told someone. That includes the name of your school or any sport or dance clubs you go to. It can also be information about where you live, like the name of a local park or the street you live on. And remember that photographs and videos might also show things like your uniform or the name of a street in the background.
Thank you for sending me this letter and remember that you can get advice from other young people on our message boards or from our counsellors.
Take care,
Sam
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