Facebook Safety

Are You Doing Enough?

By Joelle Halon

Keeping in touch with friends has always been important, but since the invention of the social networking site Facebook, keeping in touch with people has become of part of many PUC students' normal routines.

When keeping up with friends, it's nice to congratulate your long-lost elementary school classmates on a recent wedding. But is it necessary to share information like getting so wasted that you vomited all over yourself and passed out on the streets of Chicago? For some, this is a case of too much information, but the main issue of TMI is sharing your phone numbers, email addresses, and street addresses on Facebook and other networking sites. By doing so, you are leaving yourself open for stalking and other tragic occurrences.

Facebook's privacy states that the user chooses what information you put in your profile, including contact and personal information. This information is shared at the user's discretion.

Danny Santiago, a sophomore CIT major, stated that the fact that Facebook reports every action you make on the site should be cause for concern. Facebook is unique in that it almost mirrors the physical act of stalking with status updates.

Any bit of your information that you include is shown on your profile, which can lead to further problems.

Although many may think they're only sharing this information with your friends, Facebook has a "friends of friends" feature that allows your friends' followers to see the activity.

According to My Fox Alabama, Alabama police captured Spencer Shivers, 19, and Tyler Glass, 20, who robbed several homes of individuals who announced they were going on vacation during the month of July.

Although they were not direct friends of the victims, they found the information using the "friends of friends" feature, which displays status messages in the profile boxes.

Besides the aforementioned, cyber stalking has also increased since social networking has increased in popularity.

According to Bureau of Justice Statistics, as of January 2009, 46% of reported stalking cases were cyber stalking claims. Within this same report, women were the most likely targets of cyber stalking.

One victim, "Kathy," has been cyberstalked for the past year. Kathy shared her information online and received e-mails from an individual that contained lewd images.

Additionally, her stalker also discovered her whereabouts and places she planned to visit, wanting to meet her at these locations. As a result, she had to create a new identity in order to protect herself. She continued by stating that he used an untraceable IP address.

Classrooms, are turning to Facebook to enhance the classroom experience and communication.

English 104 instructor Miranda Morley mentions that she uses Facebook to communicate with some of her students, but mostly uses it for her writing groups.

However, there are students who are upset about professors using Facebook.

Sophomore sociology major Megan Byrne said that she had an English professor who required a Facebook and Facebook group for a class. Byrne stated that she thought it was quite ridiculous.

As Charity Wysong, a senior CGT student, states that if you want people to have that information, then you should decide who needs to have it and send those people private messages.

Furthermore, if you're planning a long-term vacation or a trip out of town, do not post this information in your status messages.

The Internet is not as safe as people think, so always air on the side of caution.

original article here