Pros and Cons of Social Network Essay

According to Tynan (2005, p. 72), 70% of online drug users ar concerned roughly their online secretiveness. Many users of favor able-bodied networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter complain nearly how these sites do not have the appropriate settings to pr tied(p)t online threats such as identity theft and the invasion of solitude. They believe that it is the office of cordial networking sites to bulwark users concealment. How of all time, users oftentimes forget how bequeathing they argon when it comes to demoteing insinuate flesh out and information of their lives on these sites.This willingness to give out their face-to-face information invites the online privacy troubles that users often complain around. With all these information exposed to hackers, identity thieves are given a green roost to tap into users entropybase when users decide to reveal their information online. Thus, we john affirm that the users of tender networking sites are the biggest th reat to their throw online privacy and cases of identity thefts. T present are three main reasons why state train to reveal their individualal information on kind networking sites. starting timely, people use social networking sites to connect, and to do so, they have to reveal personal information nigh themselves. As Andrews, L. (2011, p. 2) has said, Social networking has enormous benefits, economic aiding us stay in touch with people from our pasts and introducing us to people who deal out our interests. These information includes their name, age, city they are staying in, company or school they travel to and etc. The information they ply will help long-lost friends connect with them, help them make new friends with common interests and perhaps even so help them fall out a love interest.An opposite reason why people choose to reveal information about themselves is to create identity. This identity is like the information sheet of how the user is like. Users expertne ss even want to post their each thought and actions even places they have been to, it becomes a part of their life to record on to social networking sites and post their current status (Andrews, 2011). Writing about the groups and activities a person is involved in for example, tells friends and people around him what are his interests and helps people to understand him better. Lastly, people reveal personal information to cook coming to certain websites.These include gaming sites and articles provided by social networking websites, and they often request for the users personal information. Users might find it worthy it to reveal their information in order to enjoy the entertainment provided by these sites. Thus, they might decide that since their information will be kept confidential, it is practiced to provide their personal details without a second thought. It is understood that people choose to reveal their personal information online in exchange for the benefits of apply social networking sites. However, they might want to think twice after interview what dangers they are putting themselves in.Users should be aware of how they are putting their profit privacy at risk when they reveal personal information about themselves there are three major threats that users should be wary of. First of all, there is there is the threat of cyber bullying. Cyber bullying is a serious task among teenagers and it might cause mental illnesses such as depression to the victim. It fire happen when a bully gets name of the content a user post on the Internet. Unlike normal bullying, where the victim can endure understructure to safety, the victim can get bullied even at home as it happens on the Internet.The bully can even get hold of the victims home encompass or telephony egress if the victim had posted it online. One of the most famous cases of online bullying is the brain Wars Kid, Ghyslain Raza, whose homemade video of him fighting with a pretend light s abre was leaked and had more than 15 million d ownloads. He had been so bear on that he was admitted into a child psychiatric ward (Johnson, 2004). We can c prostitute from this case study how badly cyber bullying can affect a victim, and this started from a post that the victim had not expected would be leaked. completely of these threats occur because people choose to post their details on the social networking sites. While social networking sites are growing, more people are online than ever before and this includes the bad guys on the net (Viega, 2009). Thus, we have to be even more careful about the threats that we might face online. Other than that, users should as well as beware identity theft. Identity theft is the use of one persons personal information to commit fraud or other crimes (Columbia University Press, n. d. ).This can happen to users who reveal too much information on the Internet for an identity thief to pose as him or her. As Waldrop, B. (2011) has said, A c ase of identity theft can be as serious as having your entire bank account to be wiped out. This can be a very serious threat and users should beware of it. Finally, there is the lack of privacy online. The thing about social networking websites is that it has the sluttishest data link and was even rated by The Cocoon Blog as the second biggest online privacy threat in 2011.With a weak data link, it is easy for even non-users of social networking sites to hack into a users database and gain access to what the user has posted. In fact, Mark Zukerberg, the run agrounder of Facebook himself had hacked into the email accounts of two Harvard florid reporters using data obtained from TheFacebook. coms logs (Carlson, 2010). This shows how information is easily accessed on social networking sites. People often believe that it is the responsibility of social networking websites to safeguard its users privacy.However, here are some of the reasons why users have a major character referen ce to play in cheering their own online privacy. Firstly, social networking sites can nevertheless protect their users to a limited extent. Social networking sites have really weak data links and they have too many users to be able to take care of all of them. Facebook for example, would be the third largest nation in the world if it were a country (Andrews, 2011, p. 1). We can think Facebook as the presidency and its privacy settings as the law. In a real country, there would be people peter outing rules despite knowing the laws.A weak data link is like Facebooks version of a weak guard force, being unable to prevent data from being stolen. Hence, users cannot choose to trust solely on social networking sites to protect their privacy. Secondly, it is the users responsibility to provide his or her loved ones. Some of a users information such as home number or address is shared with his or her non-user family members. Thus, revealing information as such might bring harm to the family. An example would be if a burglar decides to break in to a users house, whose address he found on the Internet.If a social networking site user had revealed his address and band number online, all the burglar has to do is to type in phone number or address in Google Search and it will hold him to the users home (Tynan, 2005). Finally, it is important that users are aware of what harm information they post can bring. This is so as the information that had been posted cannot be taken back. Even if the user had used the best work to get all of his data removed, the information can be reinstalled at bottom a short period of time (Andrews, 2011).Hence, users are considered the biggest threat to their own online privacy as they are the ones who have a final say on what information they choose to post on the Internet. As mentioned in Cocoons 2011 List of the Top 10 Internet secretiveness threats, the weakest link in the privacy chain could be the users themselves. Everything th at Internet users do online leaves a digital footprint from search engine tastes to browsing patterns and social interactions. Therefore, users should be responsible for what they choose to do on the Internet, as they will never know who is watching and what online privacy threats awaits them.While enjoying the benefits that social networking websites provide them with, they should also be aware of the threats they are facing and learn to protect their own privacy. I strongly believe that the best way to do so is for users to limit the amount of intimate information they reveal online. secretiveness settings on social networking sites might help but only to a certain extent and it is better to be safe then sorry. on the whole in all, users should understand that while they are limiting the amount the intimate information of themselves online, they are also protecting themselves from their greatest Internet privacy enemy- themselves.