A critical issue in divorce nowadays is social media. What type of information does my wife have on her Facebook profile that pertains to our upcoming divorce? Does my husband have incriminating photos on his Instagram account? Has my former spouse used Twitter to publicly shame and insult me? These are important questions in a divorce that wouldn’t make any sense 15 years ago.
While our source material is about social media etiquette in the midst of a divorce — and though that is important — we want to talk about how social media information can play a role in a divorce.
There are many different pieces of evidence that can be contained on a social media account, so we’ll outline some simple ones here today. First, there could be private messages between your soon-to-be-ex or former spouse and someone else. These messages may contain information that proves he or she hid assets, or that he or she was involved in an extramarital affair.
Any social media account could also help you establish a timeline of events in relation to your spouse. Photos, status updates, tweets and location information could actually be used as critical pieces of evidence to support your claims in family court.
And of course, there is the actual content of those Facebook status updates and tweets that our source article references. If your former spouse uses social media to criticize you and insult you, it could be used as a grounds to file new litigation or to alter certain aspects of your divorce agreement.
Source: Huffington Post, “Social Media Etiquette: What Should I Do If My Ex Keeps Bashing Me Online?,” Aug. 16, 2013