DON'T LET SOCIAL MEDIA UNDERMINE YOUR DIVORCE

Over-sharing on social networking media has led to an overabundance of evidence in divorce cases.

Facebook is the unrivaled leader for turning virtual reality into real-life divorce drama. About one in five adults uses Facebook for flirting, according to a 2008 report by the Pew Internet and American Life Project.

The disconnect between real life and online is hardly unique. People are just blabbing things all over Facebook. People don't yet quite connect what they're saying in their divorce cases is completely different from what they're saying on Facebook. It doesn't even occur to them that they'd be found out.

Family lawyers also have found other interesting ways to use your addiction to social medial sites and games to their advantage. For examples, I once subpoenaed evidence from the gaming site World of Warcraft that showed Mother and boyfriend gaming for hours at the precise time she was supposed to be out with the children. Mom loves Facebook's Farmville, too, at all the wrong times. Similarly, think of Dad forcing son to de-friend mom on line, bolstering her alienation of affection claim against him.

Social networks are also ripe for divorce-related hate and smear campaigns among battling spousal camps, sometimes spawning legal cases of their own. So just because your sister thinks that she is helping your case by maligning your soon to be ex-spouse, think again. Even if your attorney states that his or her client has no control over what other people in your family have to say, regardless, it's powerful evidence to plunk down before a judge. In my opinion, it's all pretty good evidence and the judges don't really have any problems letting it in.

Here are some social media tips for making sure your personal life online doesn't wind up in divorce court:

1. If you plan on lying under oath, don't load up social networks with evidence to the contrary.

2. Going through a divorce is about as emotional as it gets for many couples. The desire to talk trash is great, but so is the pull for friends to take sides.

3. During family legal fights, it is the worst possible time to share your feelings online.

4. Grown-ups on a good day should know better than to post boozy, carousing or sexually explicit photos of themselves online, but in the middle of a contentious divorce?

Really? I am constantly telling my clients when they come in, "anything that you write or post online should be written in a way that you would not be embarrassed to ever read it out loud in open court.”

Privacy settings: Find them. Get to know them. Use them. Keep up when Facebook decides to change them. Better yet, heed your lawyer's advice and get off social networking media!