Is Your Newest Facebook Friend a Sleazeball Debt Collector?

With millions of Americans struggling in the current economic crisis, it should come as no surprise that a growing number of people are falling behind paying their bills. This is no cause for celebration -- unless of course, you happen to make your living as a debt collector, a debt-settlement company or other notoriously sleazy outfits engineered to profit off people's financial misery.

It’s bad enough that while newspapers and car companies die off, the debt business is booming. But recent months have brought a number of reports and lawsuits that exposed some of the latest -- and slimiest -- ways the "financial services" industry is using to cash in on already-struggling Americans.

Is Your Newest Facebook Friend a Debt Collector?

When Michigan resident Paula Newland fell behind in her car payments, she found herself battling some typical -- and not so typical -- tactics used by debt collectors. In addition to repeated, harassing phone calls from three companies -- including 15 calls on one Saturday and claims that phone calls were "concerning a 'family emergency' " -- Newland was told that if she did not pay up, her car would be reported stolen, and she would be arrested. The company also threatened to deploy what they called a "shame automobile" and "camp out all weekend" in front of her house.

And then came a novel approach: As if all this weren’t enough, the fact there were overdue payments for her 2005 Chevy Impala were broadcast on her MySpace account.

Outraged and humiliated, Newland filed a civil suit earlier this year claiming "damage to her business and community reputation, extreme mental distress, aggravation, humiliation and embarrassment."

Newland is hardly alone. Debt collectors are increasingly using social-networking technology to go after people in debt. Ever get "friended" on Facebook by a cute stranger? Think twice before you add them. Some debt collectors have been caught posing as random "friends" on Facebook.

According to a post on Consumerist last month, "Debt collectors are using cute chicks as bait on Facebook to track down and keep track of debtors." It told the story of one employee of a debt-collection agency, who after "friending" some 658 people, declared (rather bizarrely):

haha you guys i tricked you all my name is actually Emily and i work for cbv collections as a skip tracer i bet you guys got calls from them saying you owe money thats all my doing :) you want to call and bitch? i dare you to call me 604-[redacted]!!! I wait to hear from you :)"

Writing about the Consumerist story, blogger Angela Connor who writes at Social MediaToday, noted a trend in the Google searches that lead people to her site. "Here are a few I've seen in the last two weeks," she wrote:

1. "facebook debt collectors" (there are many instances of this one!)

2. "debt collectors are going to start infiltrating social media"

3. "Do bill collector's use LinkedIn?"

"This clearly is a topic on the minds of many," Connor wrote. "I have no idea who is conducting these searches (bill collectors or those trying to avoid them), but I know we will see this more often."

Indeed, another recent lawsuit tells the story of James Ricobene, who sued a Chicago company called Universal Tracing in April after "a senior investigator for the collection agency posted a message on [Ricobene's] daughter's MySpace page asking her to 'contact our office immediately so we can discuss the peaceful recovery' of his 2007 Mercedes GL450.