Every now and then, we hear about people living double lives. They have entire families on the side, each one kept totally in the dark about the other.
It’s a similar case for one married man, except his other wife and family are all in his head. His real wife of ten years says she felt something was off, so she went through his phone. Nothing could have prepared her for what she discovered: her husband had been living another life online. One in which he’s proudly married to her sister and is the father of her children.
His wife found it weird that he got super upset about her sister gaining weight, so she did some snooping…
Image credits: New Africa (not the actual photo)
It turns out he has a secret online persona, in which he’s married to his SIL and is the dad of her kids
Image credits: anonymous
Many felt there was cause for concern, and suspected the husband of having a “crush” on his SIL
Image credits: DC Studio (not the actual photo)
It turns out they were spot on… but things were a lot more twisted than many could imagine
Image credits: freepik (not the actual photo)
The woman revealed that she’d confronted her husband about what she had found
Image credits: Anonymous
Fake online identities are often used for malicious purposes, but there can be an upside to having one
Things are not always as they appear to be, especially when it comes to people online. In a digital world filled with stories about catfishing, you can’t ever be 100% certain that you can fully trust the person you’ve been chatting with, or whose posts you’ve been reading.
But fake identities have been around longer than the internet.
“Confidence tricksters have been operating since at least as early as the 19th century, telling tall tales and using false identities to defraud their victims of money, dignity, and livelihood,” notes a Private Internet Access blog post written by someone who claims to be named David Rutland.
“Search for me on Google, and you may find some scraps of this identity here and there… but is that really who I am?” teases the writer.
Rutland (if that is his real name) goes on to say that while fake identities are often used for malicious purposes, there can be a positive side to having one. And here’s why…
The more true information you put online about yourself, the more vulnerable you become to things like catfishing, scams, identity fraud, and other criminal activity.
“One afternoon’s worth of searching can easily reveal an individual’s mother’s maiden name (Hi Uncle Dave!), the name of their first pet, what schools they went to, and probably even the street they grew up on,” says Rutland. “An enticing email with an innocuous-looking link delivered at the right time of day can trick someone into revealing their home IP address, which will often reveal the area where they live — sometimes to within a few streets.”
This can be enough info for someone who wants to steal your identity or find you.
Rutland says if you’re considering hiding your identity online, a fake [AI-generated] face is a good place to start. But you’ll need a lot more to fly below the radar using a made-up persona.
“The more details you can add, the more convincing your fake persona will be, making it less likely that your real identity will be uncovered,” he writes.
At the end of the post, the writer reveals that he is indeed a human being named David Rutland. However, he admits to having other online presences “that also look real and have the same level of detail, but they are fake.”
“You can never, ever be sure,” he warns.
Image credits: hryshchyshen (not the actual photo)
“He seems deranged”: netizens praised the woman for how she handled the situation
