The Security Issues With Social Networks Media Essay

Social networks such as Facebook and twitter are becoming more and more popular among the younger generation. Social networks were designed to keep in touch with friends no matter where in the world they were located. Parents though are worried that their children’s privacy is not protecting on the social network. According to pole results realised most parents think their children share to much information online and that the search engines are not doing enough to protect them. Privacy is the ability to conceal personal information about yourself from other people but if they wish to show their information it is selective. Parents are increasingly worried that their children are under threat by hackers and conmen, parents want far more education and leadership about online privacy, and they clearly want the industry and the federal government to update privacy policies.

Criteria B- The IT background of the Issue

Social networks are places where you can communicate with others no matter where they are in the world and is also a ways of communication for other purposes such as business. A social network is a social structure that maps out the relationships between individuals. Technically we all belong to one giant social network, but we also belong to smaller, tighter social networks defined by our families, our friends, where we live, where we work, where we went to school, our hobbies and interests and much more. Social networks are helpful as they help us to keep all the people we know in one place and we are able to communicate with theme at any time, imagine if you sat down with a pen and paper, it would be difficult to map out all the people with whom you’re connected and all the people with whom they’re connected. That’s why social-networking Web sites are so powerful.

Criteria C- Impact of the Issue

The main issue of social networks are privacy concerns. Even though social networks were set up for people to keep in contact with friends and family around the world but despite these aspects the sites are dangerous because much information is shown. This causes parents to worry about how much information is put online. Even though most information is put on these networks is voluntary some things are not meant to be public but security issues might occur, a security issue occurs when a hacker gains unauthorized access to a written language. These breeches into personal information are a problem because people might be exposed in inappropriate manners and personal information can be gathered to do be used inappropriately. Also, talking to friends over lunch, the Internet keeps a permanent record of what we say to each other. If you are having an online conversation with your friend(s) then you should be aware that conversation can be seen by countless others and that a record of that conversation will be kept somewhere on the Internet.

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Criterion D- A Solution to a problem arising from the Issue

The only solution is for the website to create a way to privatise information to users but at the same time be shown to users that you wish it to be shown. The users theme selves can more carefully approach to what they share and with the growth of social networks, it’s becoming harder to effectively monitor and protect site users and their activity because the tasks of security programmers becomes increasingly spread out. The growth of users of these sites has grown very rapidly take this as an example, if a prison whose inmate count jumped from a few dozen to 250 million in less than five years only employed 300 guards (in the case of MySpace). In reaction to the growth of pressure to users most chief networks are now enabling users to set privacy controls for who has the ability to view their information. But increase privacy settings are not always definite privacy. Also Do Not Call methods can be used on social networks but developed in such a way that it becomes Do Not Track Kids like stated in the article.

Parents survey says social networks don’t protect kids’ privacy

CNN Wire Staff

(CNN) — Most parents think their children share too much information online — and that search engines and social networks aren’t doing enough to protect privacy, according to poll results released Friday.

More than 90 percent of the parents surveyed by Zogby International said they are “concerned” that their children share too much information online, and 75 percent said they would rate the job social networks are doing to protect online privacy as “negative.” The results, released by the nonprofit advocacy organization Common Sense Media — which commissioned the poll — do not mention particular social networks or websites by name.

Common Sense Media CEO James Steyer said the need for reform is clear.

“Parents want far more education and leadership about online privacy, and they clearly want the industry and the federal government to update privacy policies,” Steyer said in a statement

The organization begins a campaign Monday aimed at protecting kids’ personal information and reputations online.

“We need a ‘Do Not Track Kids’ approach’ similar to the ‘Do Not Call’ policies that restrict telemarketers,” Steyer said.

The results also include a survey of 401 teenagers aged 15 to 18. Common Sense Media said 79 percent of the teens surveyed also think their friends share too much personal information online, and 85 percent of them want search engines and social networking sites to ask for permission before using personal information to market products.

“The poll results present a clear divide between the industry’s view of privacy and the opinion of parents and kids,” Steyer said.

To conduct the online poll of parents, Zogby International used a sampling of 2,100 adults from its online panel, which the polling firm says is representative of the adult population of the United States. The sampling margin of error is 2.2 percentage points.

The sampling margin of error for the online poll of teenagers was 5 percentage points.

Criterion E- Bibliography

CNN Wire Staff, 2010,Parents survey says social networkes don’t protect kids’privacy

http://www.cnn.com/2010/TECH/social.media/10/08/parents.poll/index.html

Wikipedia, Privacy,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privacy

Fast Company, Privacy and security issues in social Networking

http://www.fastcompany.com/articles/2008/10/social-networking-security.html

Help Net Security, Social networking privacy issues

http://www.net-security.org/article.php?id=1331

How stuff works, How social networks work

http://communication.howstuffworks.com/how-social-networks-work.htm