Breaching of Privacy on Social Media
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Introduction
Social media platforms have become an integral part of human existence. From sharing texts, photos, the latest news, assignments, to online surveys, marketing, and customer targeting, social media platforms have a wide array of digital uses. Despite these platforms providing daily interactions for more than two billion users globally, they have received much critique regarding privacy and security. In the recent past, there have been reports of privacy and security breaches by online social media and social networking service companies and governmental agencies CITATION Lad15 l 1033 (Ladan, 2015). This work aims to emphasize the need for every user to be cautious about the security and privacy of information they share online and to advocate for all Social networking sites to be limited in what they can do with the information that users post on these networks.
Privacy and Concerns on Social Media
Privacy is viewed from the perspective of control. This includes control over personal data and information, an individual’s choice to disclose their information, the number of entities or persons present in disclosure, the physical presence of other bodies, or the choice of which persons to discuss or share these issues with. Control is, therefore, a key concept in maintaining one’s privacy. The main problem concerning privacy in social networking sites is the misuse of user data and the leakages of user information and profiles. Lately, several cases regarding breaching of privacy have surfaced. Reports have proven that Facebook and other social media platforms have been sharing their users’ personal information with advertising companies without the users’ consent or even knowledge. The data shared by these sites comprises of usernames, their IDs, and other sorts of information that enables the advertising companies to single out distinct user profiles CITATION Stu16 l 1033 (Stutzman, 2016). Advertising companies such as the Double Click Company owned by Google have been getting these data to facilitate advertisements and marketing. Facebook has been identified to go much further in the sharing of user information than other social networking sites.
Due to Facebook’s extensive breaching of privacy, its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, was summoned to Congress to elaborate and testify of these misdeeds. It has been reported that whenever a Facebook user clicks on advertisements that appear on a profile page, Facebook provides data such as the username behind the clicking and the use whose profile page clicked on the page CITATION Fuc14 l 1033 (Fuchs, 2014). Moreover, Twitter admitted to having scanned and imported their user’s phone contacts onto their website’s database to know more about their users and their relations. With this information, Twitter aimed to aid their users to find their friends. It is also reported that thousands of companies were waiting for Twitter to give them access to millions of tweets regarding their different products, services, or simply the organizations themselves. Data mining techniques have been used to fish valuable information on advertising and marketing CITATION Pre17 l 1033 (Preibusch, Soren, Hoser, Bettina, & Gürses, 2017). With this information, organizations can advertise their products to individuals who search for their products more. Despite some users not having a problem with the exposure of their private information, many care about the revelation of their private information to many people and worry about privacy guidelines, policies, and settings of a networking site. The latter group tries to use any available security policies or features to ensure that they have protected themselves. Many social networking sites have been seen to restore security settings to default after a user updates their security features. Facebook has especially been criticized on its carelessness when it comes to privacy and resetting privacy settings to default.
Other issues connected to privacy is the fact that numerous Social Networking Sites provide Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) to third party developers for the creation of applications for the website’s platform CITATION Adr14 l 1033 (Felt & David, 2014). These third-party applications are pretty common with the users, and after installation, they can access the user’s information immediately. These third-party applications are also able to post on user’s profiles or a friend’s profile. They may also have access to other users’ information without these users’ knowledge. Moreover, third-party applications are capable of tracking the user’s activities and allow other advertisement partners to access and retrieve the user’s data for advertising and other commercial uses.
Posting and sharing pictures and videos, directly or indirectly, may lead to a user’s breach of privacy or a firm’s breach of confidentiality. Another violation of privacy is that potential employers can sometimes use social networks to look up information on their prospective employees. The employers use this information to screen applicants, and these may support or hurt their chances at employment, Employers seek to find if the applicants have made political statements that conflict with their organization’s culture and ideologies. Twitter and Facebook have been identified as the primary networking sites that are used to screen potential employees and job applicants. Twitter and Facebook are preferred by employers to get a personal understanding of the job applicants rather than relying on information from sites like LinkedIn that tend to offer resume-like opinions. Therefore, social media networks should know that many employers use their websites to get information on some of their users as a form of pre-screening.
Today, many social networking sites have responded to these concerns over the breach of privacy. They have claimed that they have dealt with changes in default security changes, data storage, and the sharing of user data to third-party applications and updated or corrected these issues. However, other issues remain unsatisfied such as the critical changes that need to be done on privacy settings to allow the user to determine whether or not their information can be shared.
Organizations Lobbying Against Privacy Infringement on Social Media
Lobbyists groups against the breach of privacy on social media and technology include The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC). These groups state that technological innovation has outstripped the need for privacy protection. Due to this, the government agencies such as the National Security Agency (NSA) and corporations are tracking users’ digital footprints in methods that most Americans would term as improbable CITATION ATh13 l 1033 (Thierer, 2013). As more and more people use social media, then more data is becoming available for these entities to use. The digital footprint comprises of communication, our locations, purchases, what we browse online, and even our physical bodies. When these entities access the users’ information, then the users lose their right to privacy and control of their information. Ultimately, the rights to free speech, privacy, and security are lost in one way or another.
These lobby groups and nongovernmental organizations fight the infringement of privacy by using litigation and advocacy in courts and lobbies on Capitol Hill. They also work with technology organizations to ensure that civil rights and liberties are protected even with technological advancements CITATION Pri18 l 1033 (Privacy and Tecghnology: What is at Stake?, 2018). The lobby groups are particular in their goals on privacy. These organizations aims include securing warrant requirements for the NSA to access people’s electronic information and to ensure that these surveillance practices are more transparent to the public. The lobby groups also aim to encourage the development of technologies that that ensure that users’ electronic data is protected. These groups argue that Americans should not be made to choose between enjoying the benefits of new technology and protecting their freedoms. They work to ensure that the Fourth Amendment Act that bans unnecessary searches to extend to digital data and property.
The Government on Privacy Infringement
The government does not condone the misuse and breaches of privacy for American social media users. As evidenced by Mark Zuckerberg’s summon to Capitol Hill to testify on Facebook’s alleged misuse of American data, the lawmakers are serious in the protection of the privacy of Americans. During Zuckerberg’s drilling, he acknowledged that Facebook had allowed the political data mining company, Cambridge Analytica, access to millions of American personal data. This proves that Social media sites do not have their users’ needs in mind. Despite the Congress advocating for their rights to user privacy, they have allowed the government access to Americans’ communications.
The National Security Agency (NSA) has the power to conduct a warrantless internet surveillance program that has been supported time and again the U.S. House of Representatives. Despite opposition from lobby groups and advocates of privacy, the promoters of this spying tool state that it is useful as the tool protects the nation from any terror attacks. The NSA classified domestic spying program was launched after the September 11 attacks and is used to mainly track calls and messages domestically. The NSA maintains that these monitoring communications is one example of collecting intelligence. The New York Times exposed this program in 2005 and was said to detect any American associations with terrorists.
The NSA program was first passed by Congress, who passed the FISA Amendments Acts and Patriotic Act to support surveillance activities outside the nation. Since these Acts have already been passed, NSA, therefore, has the right to record phone conversations, especially international texts, emails, and telephone calls. This program enables them in the detection of any foreign threat that may attempt to infiltrate the country. The ACLU and other lobby groups are trying to ensure that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) can assess the government’s surveillance programs and decide on whether all these programs are constitutional or not. The ACLU also asks for more transparency in the program’s activities for the citizenry. The government argues that the UAS.S. Constitution’s Fourth Amendment protects the information that the citizenry keeps on their desk but not online information such as emails, photos, or videos.
My Take on Data Surveillance and Privacy Breaches by Social Networking Sites and Governmental Agencies
The pervasive use of information technology has changed our lives in terms of working, forming, and maintaining social connections. The main concern of these social networks is the privacy of our data. More stringent laws should be put in place to avoid social media networks from making user information available for advertising and marketing. However, if this information is to be used in the security of our nation, then the government agencies can use it. However, there should be an oversight body that regulates whether or not the government is using this information for the said purposes. Information is among the most important elements in the twenty-first century. The availability of information to the government is giving the government too much power, and this needs regulation and overseeing. Therefore, I agree with the ACLU and other lobbyists, that privacy is information, and so is the security of the nation. However, the government cannot have control over everyone’s data without the common public having a say in it.
Avoiding Data Surveillance by Social Media Networks and Third Party Applications
Security and privacy attacks can be classified into four groupings- breaches of privacy, viral advertising, malware attacks, and structural network attacks. Users should, therefore, be careful to avoid these breaches. Before signing up for any social media network, then one should review the website’s privacy policies. If the policies are unclear on how the site protects the users’ data, then one should not sign up or should limit using this platform. When signing up, one should also use a robust password that cannot be guessed easily and should be different from passwords used in other social media networks. After signing up, one should ensure that they configure their privacy settings from default since for some sites, default settings allow other parties to access your information. Users should also remember that once information is posted online, then it cannot be completely withdrawn. Despite deleting this information, some caches may still exist on other computers. Therefore, confidential data should never be posted online. Information like phone numbers, addresses, and other information that is mostly used for security should not be posted. This information includes; Mother’s maiden name, one’s town of birth, or the name of a favorite car. Identity thieves can configure a lot from this information on the user’s profile. Users should avoid installing applications that are not from trusted sources and that have been verified.
Conclusion
Since it has been difficult to stop government surveillance and access to our data, unless the issue is discussed by Congress or the matter is taken up during a referendum, we should, therefore, be more concerned on data security and privacy infringement by social networking sites and making this information accessible to corporations for marketing. Congress and lobbyists should ensure that all these privacy infringements are dealt with to protect the freedoms explicitly provided the Fourth Amendment.
References
BIBLIOGRAPHY Felt, A., & David, E. (2014). Privacy Protection for Social Networking APIs. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 179-186.
Fuchs, C. (2014). An alternative view of privacy on Facebook: Trust and privacy in our networked world. Informations Journal, 2-14.
Ladan, M. (2015). Social Networks: Privacy Issues and Precautions. The Ninth International Conference on Digital Society, Beirut.
Preibusch, A., Soren, G., Hoser, G., Bettina, M., & Gürses, S. (2017). Ubiquitous social networks? Opportunities and challenges for privacy-aware user modeling. Workshop on Data Mining for User Modelling .
Privacy and Tecghnology: What is at Stake? (2018, September 28). Retrieved from ACLU Web Site: https://www.aclu.org/issues/privacy-technology
Stutzman, F. (2016). An evaluation of identity-sharing behavior in social network communities. Journal of the International Digital Media and Arts Association, 3(1), 11-19.
Thierer, A. (2013). To Track Or Not To Track: Recent Legislative Proposals to Portect Consumer Privacy. Harvard Journal of Legislation, 111-134. Retrieved from Harvard Journal on Legislation.
