You leave your profile open, trusting that your hilarious roommates or waggish coworkers wouldn't dream of updating your status to tell all 2,482 of your closest friends how much you love the smell of cat farts.
Or worse, you get hacked, and the status bomb comes from some malicious outsider.
Rep. Donna Lichtenegger, R-Jackson, says it happened to her, and it was a nasty one. The Post-Dispatch reports that yesterday her status read "I love lobbyist! All the free food and stuff you get. This job is awesome!" The freshman legislator had campaigned on resisting lobbyist gifts.
She has since deleted the offending update, which some bloggers -- including the Plog, the blog of our sister paper in Kansas City, the Pitch -- called her out for. (Click that link for a screenshot of the status, and the cocked eyebrows it merited from her friends.)
Her profile now includes a note apologizing to her friends and constituents, and a status update warning her colleagues to change their passwords: "To my fellows State Repres. My facebook page was hacked as I was driving home today. I understand I'm not alone. Please change your passwords as a precaution"
(Seems like the hacker at least managed to decently ape her creative grammar...)
Anyway, good advice for anyone. Change those passwords, kids!
