We Haven't Met

By Rachel Law
newsdesk@thestar.com.my

KUALA LUMPUR (13 January 2011): A woman was shocked when she learned a mutual friend on Facebook had uploaded photographs of her on the social network site and accused her of spending all his money and then dumping him.

The man, who called himself Kelvin Tan, claimed that the woman Bong Xiew Mei, 22, of Kajang made him exceed his credit card limit, forcing him to be in debt with loan sharks.

Bong showed a print screen shot of Kelvin’s note which also claimed that they dated and had a sexual relationship, and that she dumped him after she had exhausted his money.

“I don’t even know this guy. I have never met him in real life. I don’t understand why he had to post nasty and false things about me,” she said, adding that she thought he was a friend she met on one of Facebook’s game applications when she accepted his friend request last month.

“This incident has affected my life horribly,” the student said at a press conference at the Public Services and Complaints Department at MCA headquarters here yesterday.

She said Kelvin first posted her photograph on Sunday night and had since then uploaded four more.

Her boyfriend, Hung Yun Joo, 25, said about 200 people were tagged on each of the photographs.

“The guy added our family members and a lot of our close friends and tagged them on the photographs,” he said, adding that he and Bong had closed their Facebook accounts.

Hung, a businessman, said that they suspected the culprit was a close acquaintance as Kelvin had published Bong’s bank account number in one of his posts.

“He seems to know a lot of her personal information,” he said.

Bong lodged a police report at Batu 9 police station in Kajang on Monday.

Public Services and Complaints Department head Datuk Michael Chong said he had received 17 similar cases in the past two years where the victims were discredited on the Internet.