It is the world's fastest-growing social networking site, and now Facebook is being used to fight crime.
Queenstown police posted a video on their new Facebook page of a guy trying to crack a safe and steal $12,000. Instead he got busted.
"It is always good catching bad guys," says Constable Sean Drader. "I don't know any cops who don't like catching bad guys, that's what we are here for, and if you still like doing your job you like, catching bad guys, this is just another way to catch them."
There are over 140 million Facebook users world wide. It is a quick and easy way to stay in touch with your friends. Mr Drader saw it as a way for locals to become amateur detectives and help solve local crimes. Video footage that would normally have been left sitting on the police computer or video tapes now hits the net.
"Most people really like helping the police people, really love helping the police," says Mr Drader. "There is also the voyeuristic thing where people like looking at things, but most people like to see criminals being daft and see how ridiculous they are."
Michael Ede's starring role was almost comical, making headlines around the world. He broke into the Frankton Tavern and using angle grinder tried to crack the safe. After an hour and with the small room heating up, he removed his balaclava and looked up in the direction of the hidden camera.
Queenstown police immediately posted it on their Facebook page and the calls came in.
"One of the people that called us said, 'We saw your Facebook story on tele, I know who that person is,' and someone said, 'I have just looked on Facebook and I know who that person is,' so we got a hit both ways.
Then next day he was arrested.
"The highest number of hits was just over 13,000 people looking at the guy trying to crack the safe, which is surprising," says Mr Drader. "We have people from Hungary, Italy, New York, Australia, all over the place sending messages saying it's a really good way to do it, so surprising. It has to be good, doesn't it?"
It is not the first video Queenstown police have put on Facebook. In another a woman stole a camera at the local Salvation Army store, and there is also one of a guy back kicking in a door, smashing the glass and then leaving the scene.
Crime in Queenstown, especially drunken behaviour has hit the headlines in the past. Mayor Clive Geddes says he fully supports the new police initiative.
"Eighty percent of our crime is created by people who don't live here, so we put up with crime today with people who are gone in two days' time," says Mr Geddes.
It is an all too familiar story. Restaurant owner Graham McCarthy is sick of diners doing runners.
"We had a couple of diners who had a meal and they walked out without paying," he says.
"This is the old fashioned dine-and-dash," says Mr Drader. "Someone hasn't paid for the dinner and the restaurateur has done the right thing – he's got cameras."
Mr McCarthy has now provided the police with video of the runners in the hope they will get caught.
"What the Queenstown police are doing is leveraging the power of what we call 'crowd sourcing'," says digital commentator Helen Baxter, "which is to use the wisdom of the crowd, the community, to get people to be able to tell them what they know."
"It has brought a sense of community back in this area in a bizarre way," says Snr Sgt John Fookes. "Although we are not a village exactly, it's reproducing that village mentality - something is happening in our patch and we want to do something about it."
So the police are now using Facebook to catch criminals but of course there is the other side of the story - people who are using Facebook to commit crimes.
A study has estimated that 93,000 New Zealanders have been a victim of an e-crime. One of the most common is people trying to steal our identity.
For what is believed to be one of the first cases of its type in this country, it has now happened on Facebook.
When Dave Nicholas tried to sign on to his Facebook site recently, something very odd happened - he could not get onto his own page.
"All the details had been changed, but not by me," he says.
Mr Nicholas works for a radio station in Hastings. The hacker, who appears to live in London, got into his site and from the other side of the world started inventing a story about him.
"Posing as me they'd said I'd been held up at gunpoint, which is a bit bizarre," he says.
The hacker had several online chats with Mr Nicholas' friends, and asked them to send money to a Western Union branch in London.
"A couple of them nearly did," says Mr Nicholas.
The case is believed to be one of the first in this country involving Facebook. E-crime specialist Marten Kleintjes says there have been at least two similar cases where hackers have got into peoples' email sites.
Hackers are not necessarily that sophisticated. They may simply guess your password, and there are simple precautions you can take.
"The thing is to have only passwords that you can guess, otherwise you become a victim of these criminals," says Mr Kleintjes.
For Mr Nicholas it is too late. He is back on the air, but he won't be going back on Facebook. He has had his page shut down.
"I don't exist on Facebook, which is disappointing."
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