We’ve all heard the stories. High-schooler gets bullied by text messages from school mates. Kids harassing each other over Facebook pages. Employers “Googling” potential employees.

Ever since the dawn of popular social networking around 10 years ago, cyber issues have affected our children.

Parents, business people, and school teachers/administrators have struggled to find effective ways to deal with these social networking challenges.

And more recently, as more and more adults and businesses have jumped on the social networking band wagon, the sins of cyber life have graduated from the school yard to our backyards and our workplaces.

The more tech-savvy we as a society become, the more social networking has become a gray area of proverbial backyard justice.

It’s not only become a way for cyber predators to gain access to their victims, it’s become a way for victims to retaliate against their harassers.

Take three cases that have made national and international news recently.

In once case, comedian Jon Lovitz tweeted the names and pictures of three high schoolers who committed racist vandalism at his friend’s home.

In another case, German Olympian Ariane Friedrich posted on Facebook the name and email address of a man who had sent her a lewd photo of his genitals.

And in a third case, movie director Spike Lee used Twitter to help spread the address of an elderly couple as that of the man who shot and killed an unarmed teen. The couple, who had nothing to do with the shooting, had to leave their home in fear for their lives.

And then you have the professional arena, with businesses finding new ways almost daily to use social networking to gain information about existing and potential employees.

Sure, businesses use social networking for background checks, marketing and advertising – that’s old news.

What’s potentially more interesting (and possibly insidious) is the recent trend of some employers asking applicants for Facebook passwords, or sites such as LinkedIn tracking members’ usage in order to assist recruiters in evaluating the efficiency of an applicant’s professional networking skills.

There’s no question that social networking can be a valuable tool when used appropriately. Clearly social networking is a growing trend that’s not going anywhere, and its results can be powerful and effective.

But since it’s an unprecedented developing phenomenon, lawmakers and enforcement authorities have little guidance on how to manage it and are scrambling trying to figure out how exactly to deal with the fallout of wrongful use.

Right or wrong? You decide. But get used to it. There’s no going back, so parents, teachers and community leaders, add it to the list of important issues to be discussed with your children.

Like it or not, social networking is here to stay, and because there are no real rules of play yet, it’s like the wild wild west all over again.

No punches are pulled, and everything we do and/or say can find its way to the Internet. And once it does, it’s permanent.

So be prepared for the world (including your boss and your grandma) to know about it.

Annette Lee is a Lake County, Calif., business owner, community college instructor and proud parent.