.
March 10, 2009
By Josh Das
In this modern era, technology provides us with many new means of communication. One of those new communication technologies is Facebook. However, with the convenience that Facebook brings, also comes some downsides. Be it the threat of your own personal security or that of your friends, Facebook may prove to be more of a liability than utility. It can hinder several aspects of your life, mentally, academically, physically. Time spent at home doing homework or other activities are now being spent socializing on Facebook.
A lot of the information that is put into your Facebook can be extremely personal. It asks your birthday, religion, political views, relationship status, home address, and even your phone number! Revealing that amount of information makes it extremely easy for a person to track you down with just one quick internet search. Facebook has privacy settings, but most users either ignore them or don’t know they exist. With this, people like school administrators could see your profile, along with your main wall which consists of comments made by your peers. They could see what you have posted on other people’s walls as well.
For example, there was an incident at Penn State, where a group of students rushed the field after a football game. The students’ identities were discovered because of comments and pictures they took and posted on Facebook. The college disciplined the students, but the students charged that this was an invasion of privacy. However, since Facebook is open to the web and everyone you added people shouldn’t expect that much privacy.
Students have been expelled from school, or even had their scholarships revoked due to remarks made on Facebook. Anything said on Facebook, even as a joke, can be misconstrued. For instance, Amanda Bunn, a junior at W.J. Mouat, in Abbotsford, British Columbia created a group named “If 200 people sign this, I’ll kick ‘insert teachers name’ in the box.” Although she thought of this as a joke, the school authorities did not. They suspended her for three weeks and then expelled her.
From my point of view, if the students in question were dumb enough to put that information out in the public domain, without setting the proper restrictions, they deserve the consequences for their actions. All the problems people have with privacy can be solved if they spend just 5 minutes changing their privacy settings.
Loading ...