Adoption agencies on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean say an increasing number of birth parents are seeking out their children on Facebook -- and vice-versa.

Traditionally, adopted children and birth parents have only been able to make contact through adoption agencies. But through the power of the Internet and the 500 million people on Facebook today, many are circumventing these services by seeking out their relatives on their own.

In the United Kingdom, the British Association for Adoption and Fostering is working on new guidelines for its social workers who are dealing with the issue, after getting calls from distressed adoptive parents whose children had been contacted by birth parents.

Here in Canada, it's a trend that is catching the attention of social workers, as they, too, see cases of birth parents and children making unexpected contact through Facebook and other social media tools.

Pat Convery, executive director of the Adoption Council of Ontario, said these online connections have led to mixed results.

"Certainly we are aware of some situations where adoptions have broken down because of connections with birth families," Convery told CTV's Canada AM during an interview in Toronto on Thursday morning.

"It's disrupted the adoption and not necessarily in a good way," she said, alluding to cases where adopted children have sought to return to their birth parents, but have encountered problems.

In other cases, Facebook has provided a way for birth parents and adopted children to maintain some positive contact at a distance.

Convery said Ontario adoption professionals have already undertaken training on how to prepare families, birth parents and adopted children to deal with the potential contacts that may pop up on the Internet.

Perhaps the biggest challenge is keeping children safe when they make contact with blood relatives who have problems that could put children at risk, said Convery.

"Those are the concerning situations that we have to be more proactive and more diligent about," she said.

Convery said the key is for both birth parents and adoptive parents to understand their obligations.

Birth parents should alert adoptive parents if contacted by their child, Convery said. And they should otherwise not try contacting children until they are 18.

And adoptive parents should know what social media tools are, how they work and how they may impact their child. If safety is a concern, these parents should "be willing to be more proactive, more diligent in taking protective measures" to prevent putting their child at risk, Convery said.