Is there Such A Thing As Privacy in Social Media?

As social media usage continues to grow the privacy debate becomes more intense.  The more we interact on social media, the more information we relinquish and the more we diminish our privacy. It is a user driven collapse that shows no bounds exposing individuals to a number of issues including:

• identify theft
• hacking of personal information
• data storage
• harvesting of personal information
• bullying/stalking and more

Social media sites actively encourage disclosure of information and in most cases information is given up easily.  Birthdays, employment information, friends, photos and slowly a picture of your life is accessible online.  This information stays permanently online and can be easily searched becoming accessible to any number of people not originally intended to see the information.  The default privacy settings on social media sites still remain weak regardless of what the organisations say.

When individuals keenly give up personal information it shifts the boundaries in terms of what is acceptable content to be considered private.  As privacy is being challenged in the context of social media are people concerned about this lack of transparency?  Or are our expectations of privacy changing?

The most proactive approach moving forward is encouraging a culture of self responsibility and education where users are aware that the more information they give up the less privacy they have.  This is especially so with teenagers who still lack maturity and don’t fully understand the consequences of disclosing information.

The line between what is considered personal information in the context of privacy is being blurred.  If people are concerned about their information, the only safe way to keep it private is to not put it online.

What to people think – are they concerned about this so called lack of privacy or is it just a perception?

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Tags: Privacy • social Media • Social Media Risks