Meet Betty, and why she chooses to keep a very public profile on Facebook

1. Meet Betty
Photo - “Remembering opens old
scars” by Elisa R. Baralt, Flickr,
CC - non-comm, attribution, non-
derivs

2. She's a friend of a friend on
Facebook.
She's 22 and has 5,000
friends on Facebook, and
more than 800 subscribers!
Photo - “entrust” by pierofix, Flickr,
CC - non-comm, attribution, non-derivs 2

3. The truth is, I was intrigued. Betty's hard to know because there is
hardly any pictures of her. Her profile only says she lives in
Morelos, Mexico. Since it's public, I could see that she started using
Facebook a few months ago, and doesn't post much. But 5,000
friends? I sent a friend request too.
Photo - “Let's glow among the greys” by Elisa R. Baralt,
Flickr,
CC – non-co mm, attribution, non-derivs

4. Luckily, she added me. Although not very active, when she posts to
her wall she writes about politics (she has good criteria), her city,
her boss, work and other things.
Photo by danny.hammontree, Flickr, 4
Some rights reserved

5. Everyone likes her posts. She's a
lovely person, wishing everyone a
good day, sends hugs and kisses. The
truth is that she's such a sweetheart,
we watch out for her and give her
advice.. (Really, it's not a good idea to
say you're taking off early from work on
Photo - “Black and White” by Elisa R. Baralt,
your Facebook.) Flickr,
CC - non-comm, attribution, non-derivs

6. Betty is so popular among her
friends that the other day when she
asked who would follow her on
Twitter if she decided to open an
account, she got 72 “likes” and
more than 100 comments – in the
blink of an eye! Needless to say,
she's now on Twitter.
Photo by mallix, from Flickr,
Some rights reserved

7. Something I like about Betty is that
she knows how to take care of
herself even though she seems so
trusting. When a guy posted this
awful comment, she told us that
she did not tolerate violence on her
wall and blocked him. We all
supported her and congratulated
her for having booted the bastard!
Photo by :jovian:, Flickr,
Some rights reserved 7

8. We started chatting via inbox, and I asked her, why do you have a public profile, that's why
you get jerks like that. She told me it's exactly because of that. She opened her account in
March, but did not enjoy it so much and abandoned it for awhile. In August she was so
surprised to see she had more than 1,000 friend requests. So she started to use it more.
And now three months later she is getting 2,000 to 2,500 requests a month, mostly from
Mexico.
Photo by Collin Key - away again
,Flickr, Some rights reserved 8

9. Did you know that Mexico ranks fifth worldwide in the use of Facebook?
She also told me that over 70% of contacts are men.
They invite her out for coffee, to parties and even job offers. She says she
never accepts because you never know who people really are on the
internet.
Photo by Chris JL , Flickr,
Some rights reserved 9

10. The job offers are always to be
a model or hostess, most from
a neighboring town called
Cuautla.
She says she always wanted
to be a model .... And the job
offers are constant, even
insistent, there are even
promises of work abroad.
Photo by Βethan, Flickr
Some rights reserved 10

11. But, as I said, Betty knows how to take care of herself and all
these invitations are weird. She thinks its all about trafficking
of women.
Photo - “Brown Eyes” by Elisa R.
Baralt, Flickr,

12. Many of us do not know or don't understand what is happening. There are so
many ways girls are tricked into trafficking. In Mexico, we have a law that
sanctions human trafficking, but if girls go of their “own will”, it's inapplicable.
And Facebook is an excellent mechanism to reach out to the girls
Experts here say a handler takes less than 4 days via Face to convince a girl to
go voluntarily to meet up with him. Afterwards she's either sweet-talked or
kidnapped, but she's gone.
There are many ways to deceive - making friends and talking girls up until their
trust is won. Other times it is the lure and urgent necessity of a job – and on
Facebook girls are invited to be models, hostesses, assistants, nannies, etc.
Photo by ViaMoi , Flickr,
Some rights reserved by 12

13. Teresa Ulloa, director of the Coalition Against
Trafficking in Women and Girls in Latin
America and Caribbean (CATWLAC), says
that in Mexico 50% of children, men and
women victims of trafficking for sexual
exploitation were contacted and prepped
through the Internet, especially on networks
such as Facebook.
"Traffickers and pimps don't have to
bother to have personal contact with their
victims in order to gain their trust, make
them fall in love with them, and convince
them to leave their homes – full of
illusions about going to meet the love of
Photo by Thomas Hawk, Flickr,
Some rights reserved their life.” 13

14. In Mexico, the problem is even
more severe due to drug trafficking.
Apart from sexual and labor
exploitation, human trafficking
feeds the drug trade by providing
“hawks”, hitmen, and mules for
drug transport. Trafficking is said to
be Mexico's second biggest money
maker, right after the drug trade
itself.
Photo by guano, Flickr,
Some rights reserved
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15. So, that's why Betty leaves her
profile completely public. She's
trying to understand how all this is
facilitated by Facebook. She's
become an internet activist, and
works on the prevention of violence,
spreading the word among youth
and children – and to her friends on
Facebook – about how to be safe.
And she's part of Take Back the Tech!
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16. www.takebackthetech.net
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