WWAY INVESTIGATION: UNCW Snaps: Social media gone wild

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — Letting it all hang out, as they say, is nothing new on college campuses, including right here at UNC Wilmington. But nowadays students are using social media to let it all hang out for anyone to see. Sometimes quite literally through apps like Snapchat and Yeti.

“I Snapchat my mom,” UNCW student Haleigh Baxter said. “I Snapchat her every day.”

Snapchat is an online service where you send pictures to friends or the general public. Pictures that are supposed to disappear within 24 hours, but area easily saved, and even shared, by viewers through screen grabs and other apps.

An account called uncw-snaps appears to give an uncensored look at college life in Wilmington.

New Hanover County District Attorney Ben David says putting this on display is worse than just a crime.

“There’s a lot of collateral consequences that go well beyond whether you’re going to get jail or probation or prison,” David said.

Sex. Drugs. Partying. UNCW students putting in all on the line online. The images range from playing with pets to piles of cocaine.

We reached out to the anonymous person behind the account hoping they would speak to us. Whoever is behind it  declined but they did say in a message on Snapchat, “I know the story presented will not be pretty, but I would like to remain anonymous. The whole idea behind it is that it’s the students choice to remain anonymous if they choose to.”

But students like Baxter choose not to run the risk of posting to uncw-snaps.

“I wouldn’t want people knowing I was doing those things if I were doing those things,” she said.

The DA says this is about more than anonymity.

“This goes to people’s integrity, and it goes to what kind of image you want to have not just in this community, but truly anywhere the internet goes, which is everywhere.”

Need proof? Take Olympic champion Michael Phelps for example. He wasn’t convicted of any crime, but a picture of him smoking pot did cause him problems.

“Even though he wasn’t criminally prosecuted for marijuana possession at this fraternity party, I think it is safe to say he lost millions of dollars,” David said.

External consequences far beyond the courtroom. But could pictures like these be used as evidence?

“Absolutely it can,” David said, “and it has been in other jurisdictions and in this one.”

Wondering if these kinds of consequences were even considered by students using uncw-snaps, we set out to ask them. Some hadn’t even heard of it, but they got it.

“It might go away from your news feed and stuff, but I don’t think it goes away from everybody being able to see it,” student Hunter Godwin said.

David says the long and short of it is this: Pictures like the ones often posted on uncw-snaps could have lifelong impacts.

“What they’ve done is made themselves far less marketable in terms of being hired or whether they’re one day going to be able to date my daughter or whether they’ll on day be able to be my nanny,” he said.

We were able to ask the owner of uncw-snaps a few questions before the account blocked our reporter from seeing anything else. Then just hours later, all the Snaps were deleted and replaced with a message warning users about this story. A few hours later the account posted a threatening video claiming to be the hacking group Anonymous. It was a warning for WWAY to proceed with caution or face consequences.

“We do not forgive censorship, and we do not forgive oppression,” the altered voice said.

An anonymous video that begs the question, with pictures like the ones you can find on uncw-snaps, just how anonymous can you really be?

Controversy over similar Snapchat accounts at other universities has led to some of those accounts being shut down. That’s led to the rise of another mobile app called Yeti Campus Stories, which is devoted exclusively to the kind of content you’ll find on uncw-snaps and much more.

UNCW leaders would not speak with us on camera about this, but in a statement said, “UNCW appreciates having this matter brought to our attention. A report of criminal behavior has not been filed, so there is no investigation underway.”

Thursday afternoon uncw-snaps was available to follow on Snapchat. After a preview of our story ran at 6 p.m., the creator decided to close the account.