Life is stranger than fiction.
Social media’s the perfect platform for posting pictures of your children.
Want to show off those cute kid dimples? Just throw some images on Facebook or Twitter and reap the widespread adoration of friends and family.
The world loves kids of all sizes and shapes! but the internet isn’t all sunshine, cats, and baby photos.
Things can get dark real fast.
Such was the case for one new mother named April.
April’s very careful about her online presence. In fact, she often uses an alias when posting images and communicating on social media platforms.
April gave birth to two adorable twins in 2012 – Sophia and Vienne.
Mothering two twins is one tall task.
Like countless before her, she took online for some support, joining a Facebook group of mothers.
Needless to say, she adores her children.
Things were going swimmingly until her girls turned one…
Then, the internet revealed its darker side when April received a message with a link from someone she had never met.
“This may be a long shot, I am not for sure, I came across a blog on the internet…”
Reluctantly, April followed the link, shocked by the results.
“I clicked on that blog and that is when I saw that all of my twins’ photos, like all of their delivery room photos, the photos after they were born, everything was on the blog website.”
The terrifying experience landed her on Dr. Phil.
She explains her encounter with a troll and virtual identity thief by the name of “Ashley.”
“She basically took my photos offline and made up a complete lie of her as their mom and has a story to go along every single picture of my girls.”
The entire time, April couldn’t believe her eyes. Her children were subject to a weird form of digital identity theft.
“I started bawling. That’s when I realized my daughters had been digitally kidnapped”.
In time, April fought back.
Soon enough, the blog was shut down. But the damage was done.
The blogger – “Ashley” – didn’t stop there, though. She continued to stalk the family for another four years.
Yes, you read that correctly. Four whole years!
She turned her medium from blog to Facebook, posting photos of the twins whenever she had the chance. She even went so far as to claim the twins as her own.
April’s husband shares a few more details with Dr. Phil.
“Police told us there’s nothing really they can do because there’s no crime in stealing a photograph.”
April took her worries past the police. She called in a private investigator.
The search was on.
Lo and behold, the investigator found numerous images of the girls with fake stories on “Ashley’s” Facebook. But something profoundly unusual caught the investigator’s eye…
The fabrication had transcended the digital world. The investigator noticed that some of the Facebook images featured real-life photo frames of the girls.
There was even a room set up with cribs for the make-believe children!
Then, April took to Dr. Phil.
What do you think of April’s harrowing tale?
Identity theft is no joke. Maybe this doesn’t constitute regular identity theft, but it’s absolutely absurd.
We hope April and her children are alright. Hopefully, they can put this entire saga behind them.
Make sure to check out the clip below to see April on the Dr. Phil Show!
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