Prosecutors - 1, Facebook - 0 in fight over user data

Here's another reminder to be careful what you post online: A New York state court ruled Tuesday that Facebook has to comply with search warrants allowing prosecutors to glean information from hundreds of users believed to be committing Social Security fraud.

The court ruled that the warrants, which applied to the photos, private messages, and personal account information of 381 users, could only be challenged by individual defendants after prosecutors gathered evidence, Reuters reports. In 2013, the Manhattan District Attorney's office served warrants to Facebook, looking for information on people who were eventually indicted for Social Security fraud, including some police officers and firefighters who pretended to be sick after the Sept. 11 attacks. Facebook submitted the records to prosecutors in 2014 after a state judge tossed their claim that the warrants violated the Fourth Amendment, but went ahead with an appeal.

Prosecutors said they found Facebook pages with photos of public employees who said they were disabled riding jet skis, playing golf, and showing off their martial arts skills. A spokeswoman for the district attorney's office told Reuters that prosecutors were able to get $25 million from people targeted in the probe, and "in many cases, evidence on their Facebook accounts directly contradicted the lies the defendants told to the Social Security Administration."

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