The Privacy Setting You Can’t Control: With Friends Like These, Who Needs Enemies?

Terri Williams

August 18, 2016

https://www.digitalethics.org/essays/privacy-setting-you-cant-control-friends-these-who-needs-enemies

 "Too Much Friends Might Kill You"  

First Impression:

Everything has a weakness, even in the strongest of protections. The title reminded me of that --- what we do online affects us eventually in many ways, like in the case of social media, every information about a friend you meet online can be used against, which always makes me question the term "online privacy" nowadays.

Quote: 

" You’re only as strong as your weakest link, and every friend or colleague is a potential chink in your armor."

Reflection Proper: 

Privacy these days should be really "private", especially when it comes to the online world. Let's face facts though: when it comes to being online, using free and convenient services has always been popular -- I mean, who wouldn't resist using a very complicated and amazing piece of work that can change your life around and it's free? But the term "free service" is really not true, since there's an old saying: "There's no such as a free lunch" which is also linked to another saying: "Everything has a price to pay." In terms of free online services, the most controversial ones would be the services that involves sociability like social media or worker community portals, and services like them involves the term "privacy" -- and let's face this fact: no matter how tight the security is one makes around his or her personal information just to protect it fiercely, there's always a weakness around it, such as the fact that whatever you do online is not only your strength but your weakness as well, and every bit of information regarding a friend or colleague related to you can be used against you. In fact, this is one of the reasons why social media needs to take ethical responsibility, and not to mention that people should be always careful of what they are doing online especially when it comes to social media or doing work. Also, the concept of the "shadow profile" is a bit odd, as in basically I think it's technically a way to distract hackers or possibly a way to get hold of thousands of information, as in accordance to the essay article's examples. In conclusion though, and I agree with the essay article on this one: you can create a very high, state-of-art security or rather necessary and super-tough precaution just to protect your own privacy, but take this helpful advice: it only takes one friend or colleague, whether via carelessness, ignorance, convenience, or job-hunting, to create such vulnerabilities that other people, companies included, can and will exploit and use to their various reasons and advantages. So needless to say, it's really best if you really keep your privacy "PRIVATE", if you catch my drift.

5 Things Learned From Article: 

1. I learned about no matter how many precautions one takes in order to protect his or her privacy, it's only going to be in vain for friends and colleagues of him or her can be used against him or her

2. I learned about  the importance of keeping one's privacy truly private.

3. I learned about shadow profiles and its definition and use.

4. I learned that providing one's social media credentials to, for instance, a potential employer, may not just be a danger to his or her privacy, but including of those closest to him or her on social media.

5. I learned that it's best to be careful, not ignorant, not rely on convenience too much, or to be fooled easily by offers online for there could be a vulnerability in my privacy's security.

5 Integrative Questions:

1. What's your opinion on privacy security nowadays?

2. Do you ever think that making too many friends online on social media can be dangerous somewhat ?

3. How do you feel about shadow profiles?

4. What precautions do you take in making sure your privacy is private?

5. How do you tend to fix the issue regarding guaranteed 100% protection for privacy?