Privacy Evolution

Texting has become very popular for almost any age. Text messages have provided the world with a new form of communication. People and especially teens desire for privacy, socializing which is why there are now unlimited SMS packages, Wi-Fi connection to their friends via the web and social networking sites. I am sure most of us don’t think of text like we do emails but we know that texts can well be forwarded just like emails. They can be stored on your phone and your providers network such as Rogers, Fido and etc.

Another example that I found was that most people are unaware that their text messages can be intercepted by anyone with a personal radio kit .Most people should treat texting like an email not sending personal information such as your credit card number, or PIN for your BB and any other personal details.

Twitter is a social networking site which lets you update your status telling your contacts and possibly the entire world what you are doing at that very moment, where you just check into.  Majority of twitters do not write about themselves, they don’t include identifiable information such as phone numbers, email and home addresses but they do in regards to the activities they are engaging in at the moment. 

For example, people use Twitter assuming that only their followers will read the message, when it necessarily isn’t true if they haven’t changed their default status it can be viewed by anyone. Default setting can play a very powerful part when it comes to behaviors online and privacy protection. 

 Most of these features are usually provided by sites like Twitter, Facebook and are totally out of user control and are set by default.  People are still unconscious of the identity theft as those are rising today. Also threats are unaware of the way to make privacy setting of their contacts.  Even though people may be using fake accounts, the risks exist when they publish something about themselves and it’s linked in with comments to certain videos or even existing links. 

The three methods of communication email, texting and twitter, twitter seems to have the least privacy protection and email the most when it comes to the protection of your personal information. As social networking continue to grow, privacy protection will develop. 

 

This graph shows while in use with social networking sites a percentage of users who are comfortable with posting personal and private information.

                              
Resources:
http://www.technewsworld.com/story/privacy/68899.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/twitter/8311522/Twitter-messages-not-private-rules-press-watchdog.html

  http://markhess.blogspot.com/2010/06/twitter-privacy-breach-settlement.html
http://www.p2pnet.net/story/16924