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TECHNOLOGY that makes it easier for people to have an affair is being used increasingly to find proof of it, say divorce lawyers.
Some love cheats have been rumbled after their partner entered their name on an internet search engine and found they were registered with online dating agencies.
Even where care has been taken to delete emails and texts, they can still be retrieved as proof of unfaithfulness.
Katie McColgan, head of family law at Berry Smith solicitors in Cardiff, said more and more divorce proceedings are starting after spouses used mobile phone or computer records as ammunition to accuse their partners of cheating.
She said, “Repeated calls to one particular number is not in itself evidence that someone is having an affair, but it is often enough to start the accusations rolling.
“Often the suspicious party cannot resist telephoning the number in question and the third party will admit the relationship, even if initially the guilty partner does not.”
She said emails and texts also catch out cheating partners.
“People try to delete them but occasionally they forget. In any case, there is nearly always a way of retrieving information from computers if a person is determined enough.
“I have even had clients who have tracked down their unfaithful partners by a Google search of their name which has revealed their membership of internet dating sites,” she said.
“People should remember that the emergence of so many new ways to communicate over the past 10 years is a bit of a double-edged sword. On the one hand, mobile phones and emails make it easier to cheat, but at the same time they leave traces that can have devastating consequences.
“If you cheat by technology then you can be caught by technology, and once trust is gone it can be very difficult to save your marriage or long-term relationship.”
Wendy Hopkins, of Cardiff-based Hopkins Law, said many affairs would blow over in the pre-mobile age because illicit communication was by meeting in person rather than using gadgetry. Now a partner is more likely to find out.
She said, “If they haven’t got the code to get into their partner’s mobile, sometimes the phone will be left on by mistake and there’s a message saying, ‘I really enjoyed seeing you last night and can’t wait to see you again’.
“People are in denial – they don’t want to accept that the other person is being unfaithful. But if they find something out, there’s no denying it.”
She said websites such as Friends Reunited put people in touch with friends from their carefree days, and an affair between them could be a way to recreate their youth and escape from their responsibilities.
John Hughes, a private investigator from Mold, Flintshire, said changes to the law could make it easier for love cheats to get away with affairs. They could even take action under the Data Protection Act for unauthorised access to records.
The Government is moving towards licensing private investigators, which would weed out those willing to delve into someone else’s mobile or computer for evidence.
“We’re fully compliant with the Data Protection Act,” said Mr Hughes, proprietor of Intec Enquiry Agency.
“You can only retrieve emails with the consent of the owner of the computer.
“It’s a grey area if the computer belongs to the family and if we’re suspicious about ownership of the equipment we won’t take the risk.
“If someone brought me their wife’s mobile phone, I wouldn’t investigate it but there are people out there who would.” Real-life techno-cheatsCase 1A wife suspicious of her husband’s behaviour ran a Google search on his name. It located him on some dating websites, where he identified himself as free, single and very available. She inspected the phone records and bank statements, which she never previously checked because she preferred to leave the finances to him. They soon revealed that all those “business trips” away were actually trysts.
Case 2A husband, married for 18 years, carried his mobile phone with him at all times but slipped up when he left it on his office desk at home.
A saucy text message arrived from his girlfriend. His teenage daughter innocently opened it and was horrified. She told her mother a couple of days later, and the mother phoned the sender. The girlfriend said the relationship had been going on for months.
Case 3A wife thought she could outwit her husband by deleting her emails to her boyfriend and keeping secret the password to her Hotmail account. But the husband was something of a computer expert and guessed the answer to her “secret question” – recorded when you set up an account in case you ever need to retrieve a forgotten password.
That gave him instant access to her email. He also managed to retrieve emails she thought she had erased for good.