BEWARE: Identity Theft Alert!

It was with a heavy heart to write this. I have been in the field of blogging for the past two years, and I am aware with the presence of people stealing other people's personal information, images, and compositions. Yet, I still became a victim of one.

I was shocked when a friend of mine, @ruffatotmeee, sent a personal message telling me that I have a poser — that someone used my photos. When I checked the link that she sent, I felt like I wanted to cry because the introduction content was also stolen from me.

Two years ago, I joined readcash, which is also a blogging platform. I made an introduction there. Check it out through this link: https://read.cash/@charmingcherry08/a-not-so-mandatory-introduction-98f15e3d

And to some who cannot take a few minutes in checking the link I attached above, here's a jpg-format compilation on the whole introduction content I made.

Note: I put a green check mark (✓) to the screenshots of my original compositions.

Now, check out the introduction piece that this poser, @merilie made here: @merilie/the-preface-of-mine

And I put a red-X mark on the screenshots.

If you will going to read thoroughly, she also got the content from me and obviously changed the wordings to somehow look unique and make it plagiarism-free.

And to you @merilie,

I know you are a Filipino too. And maybe you have been following me on readcash as well. I may not know your real identity or who you really are behind this scam, but God knows what to do to people like you. I just hope karma won't hit you so hard. Take care and do good deeds. You cannot get money for free, you gotta work hard to earn it. Play fair and do not take advantage to others, that's how you should do it.

Kababayan pa naman din kita. Mali ang ganyang gawain, kaibigan. Matuto kang magpakatotoo at lumaban ng patas. Ang paggamit ng mukha at likha ng iba ay hindi gawain ng taong gustong umusad sa buhay, kundi gawain ng taong manlamang lang sa kapwa ang gustong gawin.

And to everyone reading this, I am really sorry for this rant and complaint. Maybe I am also at fault because I have been so open to every platform I joined into. This incident made me realize that I must be careful in every move I make on the internet. People who take advantage to the convenience of being on the online world seemed to be scary, and they evolve too.

Right now, the first step that I am planning to do is putting watermarks on every photo that I will share, especially on my blogging platforms (readcash & hive) to avoid spammers and scammers from using them. Hopefully it will work.

This incident will leave a great lesson to me, and I hope to others too. And for the people who still keeps on doing this, wake up and do things the right way.