We Have Destroyed Privacy Through Social Media

The Whole World Is Watching

Privacy. It feels like something that we all strive for in today’s society, but should we have to? Shouldn't it just be there when we want it? Well many companies such as Facebook, Google, and Apple have changed the way they approach privacy, and it seems that in the year 2014, privacy is something that we can only dream of.

Source: theantisocial.com

The majority of us use Facebook, have smartphones, use Twitter, and search on engines such as Google and Bing. In addition, we subscribe to newsletters, buy things online, play games, allow our apps to access third party websites, and register for conferences. For any company to track information about you, all you have to do is load their webpage, so imagine what the above gives away about your personal life.

Such companies have “terms and conditions” documents that a very small percentage of us read in full, or at all. At this point, you sign away your rights to privacy, through laziness, yet people are still moaning that they want more privacy. Maybe society has reached a point where privacy doesn't matter anymore, and it has become a lost cause. People are programmed to think that time is against them, so why would they read through a 600 word terms and conditions section? The horrible fact is that our information is out there, in the big wide world of the Internet, and we have less privacy than ever before.

It’s got to a point now where people are unaware of how much information they are giving away about themselves, and to whom. EMC stated in their Privacy Index that 51% of respondents were not willing to give up their personal information for an enhanced experience (27% were), but how many people of the 51% were aware that they were already doing this on a daily basis? If privacy is something you strive for, then it is best to just knock the Internet on the head, and get rid of the Smartphone. In the coming years, other appliances will be interconnected with social media, so it will become even harder to privately live your life.

Source: getacoder.com

With all this fear apparent, it doesn't seem as though the government are willing to help. There is a lack of education and no immediate desire to educate the masses on the subject, and a huge uneducated audience for a concept so huge is a scary prospect. At what point did this intrusive style of living become prominent? Social media is still a very raw outlet for communication, but now, there are big businesses lurking on popular sites, trying to flog products left, right and centre.

As well as the data that is shared via social media, health records, browsing history, purchase, financial information, and past employment is at risk also. Some of these may be considered as secure, but if you share it publicly on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, then obviously it is not just your close friends who have access to this information.

We face a future where all of our personal information is stored in a computer, and the only way out is to reject technology all together. The problem with this is that we have gotten to a point where the technological tools available have become such a big part of our lives, that we have to use them in order to function, or so it seems.

Are you going to delete your Facebook page, Twitter account, Instagram account, and sell off your computers and laptops? No you're not, because the world is now set up to allow technology, and the organisations that sell it to thrive. Great things can be done with technology, both socially and medically, but unfortunately we have travelled too far down the road to retrieve our privacy.

Alex Smith

Alex is an English Literature and Sociology undergraduate whose love for written word has led him to write about some obscure topics in his time. Currently a content writer at Social Media Frontiers, be sure to follow him @AlexSatSMF.

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