A 16-year-old Maryland girl was chatting with her Facebook friend, a boy in oxford. She found out that the Brit boy was in distress after he wrote, "I'm going away to do something I've been thinking about for a while, then everyone will find out." She immediately realized the seriousness of the situation and told her parents about it.
Her parents contacted the British Embassy. The Embassy passed on the details to the Abingdon Police Department, who started to investigate the matter. After narrowing down the search to eight addresses, the police finally managed to reach the boy's house and find him.
The boy had taken a drug overdose, but was alive and was fit after treatment.
The chat feature on social networking sites is nothing new; however, this incident proves that it can be lifesaving as well. Lately, Facebook has been facing the heat when they updated their homepage and people who wanted to switch back were asked to pay for getting their old interface back. It is normal for users to share a love-hate relationship with social networking sites.
