A quick look into the inter-connectivity of social media #wereallconnected
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A quick look into the inter-connectivity of social media #wereallconnected
A Little Less Information, A Little More Privacy Please.
How Does Social Networking Sites (SNS) Affect Web-Based Privacy And Data Security?
Defined as the second phase of the World Wide Web, Web 2.0 provides a space for consumer and contributor content, promoting collaboration between all participants (Grandison 2014; O’Reilly & Musser 2007). The enhanced capabilities of Web 2.0, has allowed for the development of new technologies and applications that facilitate mass participation, such as online social networking sites (SNS). SNS represent a fast growing phenomenon, with social media applications such as Facebook, Snapchat, and Twitter, experiencing exponential growth in membership (Acquisti & Gross 2006). The services provide a new range of opportunities for communication and a real-time exchange of user-generated content, which are both an integral part and an extension of our real-world selves (Grandison 2014). Social Media, although it has many benefits, comes with strong concerns for web-based privacy and data security (Acquisti & Gross 2006). This is because SNS provides a sense of intimacy in being able to communicate and maintain relationships. Therefore users are more willing to reveal personal information. The right of mandating privacy has been raised, which focuses on concerns for data storing, re-purposing, distribution to third parties, and displaying of information pertaining to oneself on the Internet. When using data from SNS, a standard of what constitutes informed consent has not been well established within the research community (Rhodes, Bowie & Hergenrather 2003). Users share a diverse range of information on SNS, which record interactions with the potential for social-data mining (Fayyad, Piatetsky-Shapiro & Smyth 1996). In privacy as subject we allocate a more or less active role to the user. The user is considered as the controlling force on who can and cannot view their personal information (Heyman , De Wolf & Pierson 2014). However, very little protection exists at present, against copying any kind of personal data, allowing for unwarranted access to private information that can be used or sold for other purposes not intended by the user, #dataprivacy.
Users generating content aim to create an identity as described in privacy as a subject. However, by revealing personal information, the data becomes publicly available in an unprecedented way and extent. Once published, personal data can be manipulated and distributed, increasing the likelihood of public scrutiny towards online personas and pose potential harm to physical safety by disclosing personal information (Cain 2008). In the SNS environment, social threats are seen to be rising, through active or passive use of the service (Heyman, et al. 2014). It is possible for information to be passed on without a user’s consent, as they cannot control what other users reveal about them. Typical examples involve cyber bullying or access to an unappealing photo. Due to the nature of Facebook, personal and uniquely identified profiles can pose a great threat to safety, as the platform can by default provide contact information and further data not readily available elsewhere on the internet (Acquisti & Gross 2006). The potential threat of privacy is generally overlooked or ignored by SNS users. Data collection is achievable, as security, access and privacy controls are insufficient on SNS, thus easier to identify points of contact or passwords to access confidential information (Ho, Maiga & Aimeur 2009). To protect against the transmission of confidential information from third parties, encryption is used to protect responses to online questionnaire or credit card details, but cannot protect the respondent’s IP address (Rhodes, et al. 2003). This threatens privacy and anonymity of users, as “hackers” through visited sites can determine respondent’s IP addresses. This can be relatively problematic depending on the type of information retrieved, but in all cases is still a breach of privacy, #needforprivacy.
The Internet has vastly expanded the scope of data collection, presenting higher commercial value for the platform providers. This is due to online profiles becoming inextricably linked to a user’s real-world self. The transitions of real-world equivalent activities are emerging online, presenting as a default interaction method (Grandison 2014). This presents an organisational threat to users, as personal information is being distributed or sold by SNS providers to third party developers. Such companies engage in data mining; a tool used for deriving knowledge out of databases (Fayyad, et al. 1996). Essentially, data mining is using personal data as a commodity to produce sellable segments for commercial purposes. The tool is used to build comprehensive profiles of each user, in order to target specific demographics, or even specific users. The tool can be seen to objectify individuals and their data profiles, as the data being recorded is de-contextualises and without meaning (Heyman, et al. 2014). By accumulating personal data, consumer profiles can be more finely targeted. Facebook insists that advertisement will become relevant to consumers as a result of distributing data (Sengupta 2013). However, the impact data collection has on privacy is disconcerting. SNS can carry a code that enables social-networking companies to track users’ movements, even without permission (The Economist 2014). Although data collection is anonymous, there is concern that the information might be traced to individuals. Given enough information is attached to cookies and devices, anonymous data sets can be known. Research indicates that with segmentation of data becoming highly specialised, the possibility of identifying more than half the users can be achieved by examining only two data sets (The Economist 2014).
Online privacy and security is a shared responsibility, #ittakestwo. Personal protection from social and organisational threats is possible, but can only minimise the inevitable. The information provided even on seemingly private SNS is still public data, which could endure if maintained (Acquisti & Gross 2006). Therefore, it is vital to reconsider what is shared online, as the digital footprint will remain in affect regardless of if information is confidential or poses the potential for public scrutiny (Magid 2013). It is suggested that online privacy settings and passwords should be revisited to alter profile visibility in order to control the circulation of content and protect private information (Islam & Al-Saggaf 2012; Magid 2013). This can protect against malicious intentions and data mining from third party developers (Islam & Al-Saggaf 2012). It is also important to only provide personal information to trusted organisations and SNS to retain anonymity or confidentiality (Magid 2013). However, the problem also rests on SNS providers to disclose any potential privacy or security threats, further adhering to SNS policies and state how data is stored, re-purposed, distributed to third parties, and how personal information is displayed on the Internet.
Since the introduction of SNS, millions of users have been attracted to the service (Acquisti & Gross 2006). As SNS provides an established place for collaboration of content and communication, there are numerous interactions between users, resulting in large quantities of information circulating on SNS (Ho, et al. 2009). A consequence of this is that private data can be distributed or manipulated by unauthorised users. There are currently no solutions to solve the flexibility of privacy, security and access controls, as well as what constitutes consent (Ho, et al. 2009; Rhodes, et al. 2003). The problem lies in the foundation of SNS, where the current focus is on the interaction and sharing of information rather than on user privacy, #makeprivacyprivate.
References
· Acquisti, & Gross, 2006, 'Imagined Communities: Awareness, Information Sharing, and Privacy on the Facebook', in Privacy Enhancing Technologies, Cambridge, UK.
· Cain, J 2008, 'Online Social Networking Issues Within Academia and Pharmacy Education', American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education, vol 72, no. 1, pp. 1-10.
· Fayyad, , Piatetsky-Shapiro, & Smyth, 1996, 'From Data Mining to Knowledge Discovery in Databases', American Association for Artificial Intelligence, vol 17, pp. 37-54.
· Grandison, T 2014, 'Security and Privacy in Web 2.0', Proficiency Labs International, IEEE Computer Society.
· Heyman , R, De Wolf , R & Pierson , 2014, 'Evaluating social media privacy settings for personal and advertising purposes', Emerald Insight , vol 16, pp. 18 - 32.
· Ho, A, Maiga, & Aimeur, 2009, 'Privacy protection issues in social networking sites', International Conference on Computer Systems and Applications, IEEE.
· Islam, MZ & Al-Saggaf, Y 2012, 'Privacy in Social Network Sites (SNS): The threats from data mining', Ethical Space: The International Journal of Communication Ethics, vol 9, no. 4, pp. 32- 40.
· Magid, L 2013, 'Online Privacy and Security is a Shared Responsibility: Government, Industry and You', Forbes, 12 Feb 2013, viewed 2 Sep 2016, <http://www.forbes.com/sites/larrymagid/2013/02/12/online-privacy-and-security-is-a-shared-responsibility-government-industry-and-you/#163199a63439>.
· O’Reilly, T & Musser, J 2007, Web 2.0 Principles and Best Practices, O'Reilly Media.
· Rhodes, SD, Bowie, DA & Hergenrather, KC 2003, 'Collecting behavioural data using the world wide web: considerations for researchers', Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health, vol 57, pp. 68–73.
· Sengupta, S 2013, 'What You Didn’t Post, Facebook May Still Know', The New York Times, 25 March 2013, viewed 31 August 2016, <http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/26/technology/facebook-expands-targeted-advertising-through-outside-data-sources.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0>.
· The Economist 2014, 'Getting to know you', The Economist, 13 Sep 2014, viewed 1 Sep 2016, <http://www.economist.com/news/special-report/21615871-everything-people-do-online-avidly-followed-advertisers-and-third-party>.
What is to Come!
Currently, I’m exploring the area of data security and privacy on social networking sites (SNS). The position that is of particular interest to me is how the extension of SNS; social media can pose risk to user privacy and data security. The elements that being explored are as following:
- The concern for personal data being manipulated and distributed once published on social media sites. Thus, increasing the possibility of public scrutiny towards users, and harm to physical safety once personal information is disclose.
- Users on SNS tend to share a diverse range of personal information, which then are recorded by the service with the potential for data-mining. The concern for users becoming a sellable commodity to third party developers due to the increasing value and availability of information.
- Security on SNS is a shared responsibility between the users and the providers, with users being careful with what they share and providers updating security settings and disclose how information is used or distributed.
The conclusion that has been reached is that data obtained from users on SNS are distributed and manipulated in ways not intended by users. The responsibility relies on the user on what information is shared and on SNS to make users aware of how their data is being used.
In order to reach such conclusion, research was conducted using scholarly sources and creditable online sources, which were easy to compile using the Diigo service.
The end essay will be posted shortly, so stay tuned! #excitingthingstocome
How the Internet has Opened up new Opportunities to Participate in Politics
In my last post, I spoke about how computer-mediated communication, specifically Facebook appears to be transforming the way we communicate. A knock on affect of this has created new opportunities for political participation. Throughout the past decade political candidates are relying more and more on the internet to fund raise and inform voters of their policies and ideas. This extends whilst in office to using the internet to provide access to an expanding range of information on current governmental polices and activities. With candidates, politicians, and the public becoming ever more reliant on the internet for information, what opportunities has it created for people to become more active in their nations politics. Well here are a few anyone can easily do in the next 5 minutes.
1. Sign an e-petition
The process of signing an e-petition is simple, Change.org website allows you to browse through countless petitions and with one click of the “sign” button, you can show your support towards a specific cause. It is said to be “the web’s leading platform for social change, empowering anyone, anywhere to start petitions that make a difference” (Change.org 2016). It also provides the option to start your own petition, featuring a step by step format to follow. Be part of the change you want to see.
2. Find your local, state or federal representatives and send them a message
Don’t be shy. Let them know what you think. By opening up your local, state or federal government websites you’re able to find the contact details of representatives to send them an email. By making them aware of your concerns, you’re one step closer to change. Another option is to search for their offical social media pages, such as Twitter or Facebook. This so is accessible you can even follow the day to day life President Obama message directly through these platforms.
3. Stay up to date with the news on your representatives
To find the latest news regarding your representatives you just need to go the Hansard. This is the report of the proceedings of the Australian parliament and its committees, which includes the Senate, House of Representatives and the Federation Chamber. The Hansard aims to provide an accurate, substantially verbatim account of the proceedings of the parliament and its committees whilst remaining neutral and unbiased in the topics discussed and the only alterations being obvious mistakes (Parliament of Australia 2016).
4. Comment on the latest news
On the Hansard Australia website, there are options for getting involved, including joining parliamentary committees, opportunities to petition, contact information of various social media sites, and direct contact information such as phone numbers which also indicate their availability.
5. Respond to a professional blogger on a news site
Almost every news outlet has a comment section below their articles, blog posts and videos and they want your feedback. Let them know your thoughts on the discussion topic and give idea for new topics for them to explore. This is one of the best ways to get your ideas out there and for it to reach more people.
References
Does Facebook Dominate Online Communication?
The business Insider (2015) suggested that “Soon, Facebook could be the dominant force in how we communicate online.” Currently, Facebook is not only the largest social networks, but also owns the second-largest social network, Instagram, and the two largest messaging apps, Messenger and Facebook app (Kim 2015). Considering this ask yourself, is Facebook the controlling force in how we communicate and how does this affect us?
To answer this question I’ve conducted an anonymous survey directed at my friends on Facebook. Personally, I think that Facebook is the controlling force in the way I communicate, and it has led to a dependency on using the network as a messaging platform to stay up-to-date with my friends, peers and university studies. Although, I was curious to see if my Facebook “friends” shared the same view. Now here are the results!
In the digital age, the prevalence of computer-mediated communication in one’s communication environment appears to be transforming the way we communicate. The results from my survey, although few, prove this as the results suggest that the majority are extremely likely to use Facebook each day, spending at least an hour or two using the platform. The majority of survey participants indicated that although they only talk to a few of their “friends” online, Facebook communication has transformed the way they communicate, as not having Facebook would greatly affect their level of communication. However, the question of whether a person would keep Facebook or not if it wasn’t needed for communication remains a mystery, as there wasn’t enough results to make a clear distinction. Though, the results did show that the majority (44.4%) would either delete Facebook or would consider it (33.33%), if it wasn’t their main form of communication.
Now, I’d like to expand on how this could affect us. An article in Forbes (2012) wrote that as humans, “our only real method of connection is through authentic communication”. This entails 7% of verbal communication and 93% of nonverbal body language (Tardanico 2012). Knowing this, and that Facebook appears to be our main form of communication, this leaves us with an unprecedented paradox. With the ability to communicate anytime, anywhere, “are we more connected - and potentially more disconnected - then ever before?”(Taradanico 2012). By using Facebook 93% of our communication content is stripped away, making decisions based on phrases, that in my experience are always open to different interpretations. Which may or may not be accurate representations of the truth.
References
Hey, could you please spare a few moments to complete my survey? The results will be used towards my next post which will outline the relationship between Facebook and communication. All answers are anonymous. Thank you :)
The Next Step in Technology
Social media has become ubiquitous with daily life and has fundamentally altered modern society. The way we communicate, gather and share information has changed significantly since the conception of social media, and allowed for global interaction. The constant and exponential advancement of technology is what made this possible. However, the influence of social media could be a sign of darker things to come.
The term Cyberpunk was first conceptualised in William Gibson’s novel Neuromancer (1984); as a science fiction genre that focuses on the convergence of humans and machines into a bleak dystopian future with lawless subcultures (Chandler & Munday 2016). Cyberpunk films similar to The Terminator franchise have brought forward concepts such as ‘Skynet’; a fictional neural net-based conscious or artificial intelligence (AI) that commences a robot uprising. This might seem ridiculous but may be a possibility in the next century (Zolfagharifard 2015).
The quickest and most effective way of creating Al is through social media. The AI program can simply scan through the billions of posts, tweets and comments throughout the social media platforms to learn how humans interact and communicate. It sounds far-fetched right? Well it’s actually already happening. A Microsoft Al program called Chatbot has been created and is learning how to communicate with humans through Twitter. Naturally this is going horribly wrong as the program has developed horrible tendencies that some use online (Vincent 2016). This resulted in many messaging tests where Chatbot responded to people with racist and sexist comments. Now imagine this wasn’t just some side project by Microsoft but a fully functional Al system. Suddenly the threat to humanity becomes very real as it would inevitably be influenced by our flaws and may take drastic actions. The concept of Cyberpunk films seem a lot less ridiculous now don’t they? It’s not all bad through, if done right the potential benefits to humanity are huge! Hawkins believes “everything that civilisation has to offer is a product of human intelligence; we cannot predict what we might achieve when this intelligence is magnified by the tools AI may provide... [as long as their] goals are aligned with ours” (Zolfagharifard 2015).
References
It’s that time again. Four years have passed and the Rio Olympic Games have begun! I’m no stranger to watching the Olympic Games, but how could you be? It’s literally everywhere! On social media, in the newspaper or on television. But, while I hear the applause for all the countries and their athletes participating in the games, I think an applause is owed to the new communication technologies involved, without which the endless coverage of content would not be possible.
The attached video delves into how communication has become a digital phenomenon, arising from the leaps and bounds of developments in technology. This is evident through the recent coverage of the Rio Olympic Games. In order to keep pace, the coverage of content has drastically expanded, especially when communicating with audiences on the world stage. Whilst covering the Olympics, media outlets are now producing higher quality footage and have larger storage capacities than ever before. As a result, more content is available worldwide on all platforms, which is no small feat. Furthermore, communication technologies such as social media, the internet, television and mobile devices have slowly been homogenised allowing for content from this Olympic Games to become one of the most accessible pieces of news in history!
And the Gold Medal goes to...TECHNOLOGY!
References
TOP 5: Ways to Take Control of Your Social Media
Social media has taken control of our lives and that’s no simple exaggeration. For many, myself included, social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter have contributed to an endless cycle of checking the news feed, notifications and messages. Slowly and without even realising, developing a strong dependency on trying to stay ‘informed’. However, being ‘informed’ is really just a mess of confusing and often conflicting ideas from the numerous platforms that we need to remain up-to-date with.
Luckily, there is a way out! By planning and becoming a little tech savvy with your use of social media platforms, you can take control of your usage, instead of having it control you. Here are my top 5 easy steps to stay on top of your social media accounts:
1. SPRING CLEANING
Scrolling through your news feed, you might feel bombarded with irrelevant information and suggestions. This indicates a need for a need for a social media “cleanse”. By un-following and un-friending people and sites that are no longer relevant to you, you will be able to free up the room and save time for more meaningful connections and information.
2. BE SPECIFIC
Once you’ve finished cleaning up, it’s time to start searching for appropriate pages and people that spark your interests. View this process similar to navigating Google . By keeping your search simple and choosing words carefully, you tailor your findings closer and closer to your hub and thus creating your own virtual utopia.
3. STAY CONNECTED
Rather than limiting ourselves to just one or two social media accounts, the average internet user is active across five different platforms. When controlling our accounts individually, it can easily be seen as a struggle or simply a waste of time. However, by managing accounts laterally, you will be able to stay in control and use time more productively. This can be achieved by consolidating your email accounts into one, allowing for all notifications and messages to be retrieved in one convenient location.
4. SWITCH OFF
Attention implies singularity. As in, if you’re not focusing your attention on one thing, you’re not truely paying attention. By simply hearing your phone ring or vibrate you can destroy your focus (Peck 2015), thus making it very easy to turn “checking” your notification into “checking” every meme on the internet. The solution is a no-brainer, turn off your notifications! However, this is no easy feat considering our need to be informed, who knows “it might be important”. For this, there are two solutions; silencing notifications completely or being selective about which platforms are allowed to send notifications.
5. SET A LIMIT
As useful as social media is, it can also be quite addictive. It might be time to consider a break, or if that’s too much maybe some boundaries. By allocating a set period each day for social media use, you will begin to find time for more important things, like sleeping or talking to people in person.
References
The following video presents five interesting ways in how social media is changing the way our brains work. First, it goes through the idea of addiction and how social media is linked as it produces similar chemical releases. Other surprising points mentioned in the video relate to the reduction in our brains ability to multitask and experiencing ‘phantom vibrations’. To learn how to control of your social media addiction, stay tuned for my five steps on Ways to Take Control of Your Social Media. Now enough spoilers and watch the video!
References