ABA Site-tation has a very interesting post on Facebook Privacy, Lawyer Social Networking, Online Reputation Management, and Case Investigations.
It begins:
According to the 2010 Legal Technology Survey Report: Web and Communication Technology volume lawyer respondents increasingly use social networking sites. Reasons reported include for professional networking (76%), client development (42%), and case investigation (6%). Recent security and privacy issues surrounding Facebook have implications for use of Facebook by lawyers and their clients in the areas of online reputation management and case investigation.
The post also mentions a search engine called Openbook which searches people’s Facebook posts. As the post notes, “Openbook could be used as a tool for online reputation management or case investigation; however, note that different states may have differing ethics rules on the use of social networking sites for case investigation.”
See the full Site-tation post for more.