>

Women also use Facebook, MySpace and other sites to find the "other woman." Take the case of "T" Bodnar of Hoboken, N.J., who was outed on MySpace a year ago by an ex-girlfriend he dated for five years, and his most recent girlfriend whom he's since broken up with. Bodnar, 38, drummer in the cover band Lifespeed, was in the process of trying to end the newer relationship after he resumed contact with his ex. Both women found out about each other and found one another on MySpace. The women began texting and sending photos back and forth.

The episode, Bodnar says, "really made me look like a piece of s**t. I didn't feel good about this. I was trying to walk away quietly but within a couple of hours on MySpace, they were connected and trash-talking me." The women left nasty messages on the band's home page and blog.

"I felt kind of violated and that my privacy was worthless and because I wasn't exactly being a stand-up guy [by talking to both and having feelings for both], I was very embarrassed. I had no control of the situation," he explains.

Last year in the uber-cool blogging world, a relationship between bloggers Moe Tkacik and Richard Blakeley, both of Gawker Media, exploded into the public domain and turned ugly post-breakup. Tkacik had written an unflattering account of the couple's liaison on her personal blog. Blakeley retaliated by posting a video of himself simulating sex with a dead fish.

"The stakes are really high. Technology is used so regularly now not only to uncover what's going on with relationships, but you can go online and send a text message from a number that's not your number," says Danine Manette, author of Ultimate Betrayal: Recognizing, Uncovering and Dealing With Infidelity.

"I think with the advances in technology and the ability to know in real time the whereabouts of the person you're looking for, we're going to see more and more vengeful assaults. It's going to get ugly," says Manette, who's also a criminal investigator with a law degree.

Indeed, technology changes everything, but old-fashioned gumshoe tactics remain effective to catch cheating spouses or partners. Jerry Palace—a former New York City police detective—runs Check a Mate, which specializes in matrimonial investigations. He conducts GPS tracking, background investigations, uses hidden cameras and other methods to confirm cheating.

"The big thing today is following them. Years ago, we sent decoys, you sent a girl to somebody's boyfriend or husband," Palace notes. He says legally, there are now more restrictions on what he can do with phone and financial records and bills so "we've gone back to the basics— it's surveillance."

Most of his clients, like Mary, whose name is changed to protect her identity, use the tactic to confirm what they already know, to confirm "that they're not crazy."

"When somebody calls me, it's almost like a Playbill, there's a whole cast of characters," says Palace. "They say 'I just want to know if I'm crazy.' The investigation reinforces what they already know."