In our lifetime, we have watched social media, in all forms, go from a casual pass time to essentially what our world revolves around. This means that there has to be rules, laws and regulations covering all aspects of media use.
The thing that interests me the most is our privacy or lack thereof on social media. Before this class, I have always been very open on social media and had not really payed attention to or even cared if what I was posting was private to the public. I always thought “well I’m not posting anything bad so it doesn’t really matter if people see it”. The truth is though, it does matter. Whether it is my family members, future employers, or even random strangers, anyone can see what I am posting about my life.
What surprised me the most is when we were prompted to Google ourselves. This led me to a whole host of photos of myself that I had completely forgotten about. Things that I posted in my teens years are not necessarily things that I want attached to my name for the rest of my life.
This is where privacy comes into play. Since searching for myself on Google, I have adjusted my social media settings to be more private. I previously cared more about the reach that I had to my audience so by keeping my accounts public, more people were able to find my page. I do not have much of a desire for that now as I get older and use my social media less frequently.
Overall, privacy is much more complex than just changing your settings on social media though. The thing that really intrigues me about privacy is the fact that the majority of us don’t even realize how little privacy we actually have. We are constantly being watched, monitored, and accounted for. Every search we make, every place that we go, and every post we put on the internet is out in the open whether our settings are changed or not.
This is something that I have recently becoming more aware of due to this course. Watching the Ted Talks that discuss this issue are what really opened my eyes. I had no idea that every place that I travel or connect Wi-Fi to is constantly being logged. I personally do not think this is a huge issue for me because like I said, I have no reason to worry about being tracked or looked into on the internet. At the end of the day though, it is an invasion of privacy.
With this new information that I have been accumulating, I have begun changing as much as I can to protect my privacy. Often times, apps will ask to use your current location which is fine in certain instances where it may be needed, but when I do allow it I make sure to choose the “only allow once” option. This prevents the app from using my location when I am not using the app.
