But My Post Was Private! Why We Can’t Assume Privacy on Social Network Sites

29/04/2010 samantha_w 33 comments

But My Post Was Private!
Why We Can’t Assume Privacy on Social Network Sites

By Samantha Warren

Participation in social network sites such as Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter has dramatically increased in recent years, offering users an online environment where they can share what they are doing and express their views (Huberman, Romero & Wu, 2009; Rosenblum, 2007). This explosive growth and the amount and type of information participants reveal has lead to increased scrutiny of user’s private lives. Personally identifiable information, along with sexual, political or entertainment interests all provide a disturbingly intimate insight (Gross & Acquisti, 2005). In this paper, I will be focussing on the issue of privacy and social network sites, and how we cannot assume that what we post on a social network site is private.

boyd and Ellison (2007) define social network sites as:

“web-based services that allow individuals to (1) construct a public or semi-public profile within a bounded system, (2) articulate a list of other users with whom they share a connection, and (3) view and traverse their list of connections and those made by others within the system”

Social network sites provide a setting for online interaction and communication, with sites typically displaying a user’s profile and their social network of other users. Profiles display personal information such as age, location, interests, and many allow users to upload photos and other multimedia (boyd & Ellison, 2007).

The visibility of and access to a user’s profile can be set by the user and varies by site. Interfaces allow millions of users to share and follow the lives of families, friends, acquaintances and often unknown numbers of strangers (boyd & Ellison, 2007). Gross & Acquisti’s (2005, p.5) study of Facebook users found that:

“90.8% of profiles contain an image, 87.8% of users reveal their birth date, 39.9% list a phone number …… and 50.8% list their current residence. The majority of users also disclose their dating preferences (male or female), current relationship status (single, married, or in a relationship), political views (from “very liberal” to “very conservative”), and various interests (including music, books, and movies). A large percentage of users (62.9%) that list a relationship status other than single even identify their partner by name and/or link to their Facebook profile.”

Rosenblum (2007, p.47) created a fake MySpace profile in order to test the amount of personal information that could be obtained. The randomly chosen profile was that of a woman who was generally careful about the information she posted; it included her age, but not her birth date; her home state, but not the town; her first name, but not her last. These precautions were negated by the fact that she posted her AOL Instant Messenger screen name. This linked her MySpace page to her blog, which provided enough information to determine her name. A brief examination of her blog revealed one post titled “surveys,” in which she posted her detailed responses to a number of online surveys. Among these were answers indicating that she had been taken into police custody, had stolen in the past and had been medicated for attention-deficit disorder and obsessive-compulsive disorder behaviour. All this information was readily available and easily accessible.

There are a number of reasons why social network site users reveal so much personal information. Site architecture and privacy defaults are skewed towards disclosure, while alleged ‘relaxed attitudes towards personal privacy’ (Gross & Acquisti, 2005, p.3), combined with user’s lack of understanding of the possible privacy risks increase the assumption that user’s information is readily and intentionally disclosed (Woods, 2010). Additionally, the perception of social network sites as private spaces impedes a user’s ability to control impressions and manage social contexts online (Gross & Acquisti, 2005).

The willingness of users to post personal information on social network sites creates huge amounts of data – data that is worth millions to marketers, who use personal information collected in public online databases for commercial purposes. This commodification of information means social network sites want as much user data public as possible. Facebook’s 2005 privacy policy stated that:

“the site will collect additional information about its, not originated from the use of the service itself: participants’ information may include information that the participant has not knowingly provided: personal data may be shared with third parties” (Gross & Acquisti, 2005, p.4).

One way social network sites can achieve this is to make their default settings public. The default privacy settings of new accounts are set to make the users profile publicly searchable and the content freely visible. In 80% of cases, however, users will stick with these default settings (Peterson, 2009). Peterson (2009, p.22) described this proclivity as “the power of the default” meaning that “users are simply too lazy, confused, or irrational to make a choice and instead just stick with the default option”. This in turn has lead to claims that “privacy is dead” and users don’t care (boyd, 2010). Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg maintains “people have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people – and that social norm is just something that has evolved over time” (McCullagh, 2010). Following this theory, social network site developers can justify making publicly available data more public (boyd, 2010). Additionally, the “power of default” is indicative of the user’s lack of understanding of the risks associated with having so much information publicly available. The amount and depth of personal information disclosed on social network sites, intentionally or otherwise, can expose users to personal attacks, stalking, re-identification and identity theft, both online and offline (Gross & Acquisti, 2005).

The very act of signing-up to a social network site can create confusion about what is private and what is public. The member information requested by the site, such as email addresses, birthdates and real names, gives a false sense of intimacy and privacy, and leads to the assumption of social network sites as private spaces (Peterson 2009; Rosenblum, 2007). User’s perceptions of what is private online are influenced by the belief that a problem that afflicts others will not affect them. This in turn causes them to underestimate privacy risks and thus undervalue their privacy, often realising their mistake only after a breach (Peterson, 2009).

Weintraub (1997) postulates that private is “what is hidden or withdrawn versus what is open, revealed, or accessible”, and that private things are “things that we are able and/or entitled to keep hidden, sheltered, or withdrawn from others”. Nissembaum’s (2004) concept of contextual integrity describes the expectations people have about what level of protection our information requires, expectations about what data may be shared in a given situation and with whom that data may be shared. She argues that privacy is violated when individuals do not respect social norms of appropriateness and distribution (Peterson, 2009; Nissembaum, 2004).

In real life, people try to restrict access to information about themselves to obtain privacy; they also use privacy to protect relationships. Different kinds of relationships require different levels of protection from outside scrutiny (Lange, 2007). People conduct themselves according to the social context they find themselves in, be it home, work or public; they become different people to maintain the standards of conduct and appearance of their social group. Privacy issues arise when these different “presentations of self” collide on the flat dimension of the social network site; “the architectural heuristics that guide privacy practices in the physical world” are removed (Peterson, 2009, p.12). User’s need to determine how to best present themselves in a multi-use public space; information shared “in the wrong way and with inappropriate others” leads to the disintegration of social contexts and changes how and to whom information is distributed and communicated. In certain occasions people want information about themselves to be known only by a small circle of close friends, and not by strangers. In other instances, they are willing to reveal personal information to anonymous strangers, but not to those who know them better. Social network sites do away with the privacy barriers that user’s keep between different aspects of their lives (Peterson, 2009; Gross & Acquisti, 2005).

The virtual nature of the social network site also removes the “real world” separation of social situations, leading to a loss of the contextual and situational awareness that guides offline interactions. It is possible for somebody’s profile to be connected to hundreds of users directly, and thousands of others through the network’s ties; users know that someone is looking at their content, but they don’t necessarily know who is accessing it or what they are viewing. This inability to determine or even recognise the “invisible audience” leads users to unintentionally disclose information, which can have unforseen consequences (Peterson 2009; Rosenblum, 2007).

“In 2009, a 16-year-old employed by a marketing firm in England returned home from work and wrote on her Facebook that her job was “boring.” She was promptly fired after colleagues accessed her profile and passed on the post to her supervisor. “[This] display of disrespect and dissatisfaction undermined her relationship with the company,” a representative of the firm said. “Had [she] put up a poster on the staff notice board making the same comments and invited other staff to read it there would have been the same result.” Skeptics argued that employers rarely followed their employees to the local bar to eavesdrop on any griping that regularly occurred there” (Peterson, 2009, p.11).

The lack of physical separation of social situations removes the sense not only of how public user’s information is on social network sites, but also how permanent it is. The false belief of privacy leads user’s to feel protected from the consequences of their actions online. Communication on social network sites, and indeed, on the Internet in general, is recorded, disseminated and stored. It is a permanent digital record that can later be searched and accessed by third parties (Rosenblum, 2007).

As the Internet becomes the preferred social forum of tomorrow, our private lives will increasingly be lived out in the public domain. The lucrative marketing nature of social network sites means there is little or no incentive to create personal information verification procedures or enhanced scrutiny with regard to posted information. In order to best protect our privacy, we need to use our common sense. Once any information is posted, it is all but impossible to purge every iteration outside the social network, so the best strategy is simply to exercise judgment in what personal information we choose to post. This is the only thing that offers the hope of safeguarding reputation and privacy. Awareness is key to solving the privacy problem. We as individuals need to be more proactive about educating each other and protecting our privacy on the Internet.

References

Arthur, C. (2007). Do social network sites genuinely care about privacy? The Guardian, Thursday 13 September 2007. Retrieved April 4, 2010 from http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2007/sep/13/guardianweeklytechnologysection.news1

Barnes, S. (2006). A privacy paradox: Social networking in the United States. First Monday, Vol. 11, No. 9. Retrieved April 1, 2010, from http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue11_9/barnes/index.html

boyd, d. (2010). Making Sense of Privacy and Publicity. SXSW. Austin, Texas, March 13. Retrieved March 20, 2010 from http://www.danah.org/papers/talks/2010/SXSW2010.html

boyd, d. & Ellison, N. (2007). Social network sites: Definition, history, and scholarship. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Vol. 13, No. 1. Retrieved March 17, 2010 from http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol13/issue1/boyd.ellison.html

Google. (2009a) Advertising and Privacy. Google. Retrieved April 1, 2010, from http://www.google.com/privacy_ads.html

Google. (2009b) Privacy Policy. Google. Retrieved April 24, 2010, from http://www.google.com/privacypolicy.html

Gross, R. & Acquisti, A. (2005). Information Revelation and Privacy in Online Social Networks (The Facebook case). Pre-proceedings version, ACM Workshop on Privacy in the Electronic Society (WPES). Retrieved April 3, 2010, from http://www.heinz.cmu.edu/~acquisti/papers/privacy-facebook-gross-acquisti.pdf

Huberman, B. A., Romero, D. M. & Wu, F. (2009). Social networks that matter: Twitter under the microscope. First Monday, Vol. 14, No. 1. Retrieved April 1, 2010 from http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewArticle/2317/2063

Joshi, P. (2009). Every move you make, Google will be watching you. Business Standard. Retrieved April 1, 2010, from http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/every-move-you-make-google-will-be-watching-you/57071/on

Lange, P. G. (2007). Publicly private and privately public: Social networking on YouTube. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Vol. 13, No. 1. Retrieved March 17, 2010 from http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol13/issue1/lange.html

Nissembaum, H. (2004). Privacy as contextual integrity. Washington Law Review, Vol. 79 No. 1. Retrieved April 1, 2010 from http://crypto.stanford.edu/portia/papers/RevnissenbaumDTP31.pdf

Peterson, C. (2009). Losing Face: An Environmental Analysis of Privacy on Facebook. Working paper. Retrieved April 1, 2010 from http://etc.cpeterson.org/research/workingpapers/2010/losingface_workingpaper.pdf

Rosenblum, D. (2007). What Anyone Can Know: The Privacy Risks of Social Networking Sites. IEEE Security and Privacy, Vol. 5, No. 3. pp. 40-49. Retrieved April 1, 2010 from IEEE Xplore database.

Soghoian, C. (2008). Debunking Google’s log anonymization propaganda. CNET News. Retrieved April 1, 2010, from http://news.cnet.com/8301-13739_3-10038963-46.html

Weintraub, J. (1997). The theory and politics of the public/private distinction. In J. Weintraub & K. Kumar (Eds.), Public and Private in Thought and Practice (pp. 1-42). Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. Retrieved April 2, 2010, from http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=XuIfZxddGkkC&oi=fnd&pg=PA1&dq=The+theory+and+politics+of+the+public/private+distinction&ots=FNrridAoY9&sig=9UcAZ5p23hqbcXmB7Lj8re8TFp4#v=onepage&q=The%20theory%20and%20politics%20of%20the%20public%2Fprivate%20distinction&f=false

Woods, R. (2010). Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg says privacy is dead. So why does he want to keep this picture hidden? The Sunday Times, January 17, 2010. Retrieved March 18, 2010, from http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article6991010.ece

Social Networks Facebook, myspace, Privacy, social networking sites

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Comments

Written by li ying about 2 years ago. Reply

Hi Samantha.
I agree with your argument where people wants privacy in the offline world but there’s no privacy on the online world. Back in my country in Malaysia, we show our privacy by putting fences around the house so that our next door neighbor will not interfere with our lives. Whereas in the online world, there are no obvious fences. As you stated, Facebook changes their privacy settings regularly which confuses users as they had to change and update their privacy every time this happens. With all the personal information provided online by people who does not know the dangers of online world, other online users might be interested with them etc. One of my friend who I think is stupid because she accepts every friend request. Months later, she found two fake account of herself on Facebook. I do not know what she’ll do but based on my experience, my other friend found a fake account in Friendster, we emailed the ‘people’ and reported the profile. Two days later, the profile was deleted by Friendster.
Written by Louise about 2 years ago. Reply

Like many others, I’m starting to get a little worried about Facebook’s privacy setting. In the past, I’ve always tried to keep my public SNS profiles private. I’ll be searchable, but to get any information, you’d have to friend me – I go as far as refusing to use a photo of myself as my main picture.
Usually I simply click a button to make everything private, then log out to check that everything is indeed private to the world. But with the changes in Facebook, the profiles you see when you’re logged out are different than when you log in. Now if I want to check on how private my profile is, I’d have to make a completely new ‘alias’ account. Of course, this doesn’t cover the “friend of” settings on Facebook. I consider myself to be someone who is able to navigate the web and SNS quite confidently, so these new changes which mean I’m losing control of my online identity are really turning me off of Facebook. From the sounds of current reports, a lot of people are having the same feelings and I’ve seen blog posts with people trying to find the next SNS to replace Facebook. As we saw with Myspace, once a few friends start interacting on a new SNS, all their other friends will follow. I think that ultimately, their confusing privacy settings will ruin Facebook.
Written by Emily about 2 years ago. Reply

You make a strong argument, about a topic that is very relevant to all of us who use social networking. I strongly agree that awareness of the issue of privacy is very important – so many SNS users just don’t care about how the information they post could be seen or used. This might be because they assume that only their intended audience will be interested in the content they share, or even because they don’t fully understand their own privacy settings.

My own take on the subject is that because everyone else is using social networking sites and sharing lots of personal information, it’s difficult to pinpoint exactly why information-sharing can be a problem. This ties into the “power of default” that you’ve talked about in your paper.

Like Sharlene, I also found your quote from Mark Zuckerberg really interesting – he claims that this new culture of sharing large amounts of personal information is just a “social norm” that has “evolved over time” ¹. But I would argue that this “social norm” hasn’t just “evolved” – it has been actively created and nurtured by those who have something to gain from it – namely, Mark Zuckerberg himself ².

¹ McCullagh, D. (2010). Why no one cares about privacy anymore. Retrieved May 15, 2010, from http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-20000336-38.html

² While searching for the McCullagh article, I found this other source that supports my idea that “Facebook itself is a major agent of social change”:
Kirkpatrick, M. (2010). Facebook’s Zuckerberg says the age of privacy is over. Retrieved May 15, 2010, from http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/facebooks_zuckerberg_says_the_age_of_privacy_is_ov.php
- Written by hardik gondha about 2 years ago. Reply
  
  Very interesting paper Samantha. After reading your paper i think that very small number of people or none read the pages and pages of terms and conditions pages and pages of legalese that pretty much state you don’t have any personal data and you have absolutely no privacy on that site. They just click on that small box which says ” I agree” (Silver, 2010). They do not know the circumstances that all this could lead too.
  
  And i agree completely to the statement where you say ” data that is worth millions to marketers, who use personal information collected in public online databases for commercial purposes “. But again if we talk about facebook, there have been instances where they changed all the privacy settings to default on all the profiles. I personally think, they would not agree to that fact that such action were performed by them for the marketers to grab all the info they can from the profiles. My paper argues around the topic how social networking websites are turning into social marketing websites where i have discussed how these marketers try to grab the data from us in different ways.
  
  Reference:
  
  Silver, C. (2010). The Facebook Privacy War: What is Personal Data? Retrieved 05 13, 2010, from Wired: http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2010/05/the-facebook-privacy-war-what-is-personal-data/
Written by JeremyN about 2 years ago. Reply

Hi Samantha,

Great paper on a topic that is pretty hot and continues to be in the headlines. An article in the Sydney Morning Herald today again reports the backash Facebook are seeing due to their privacy policies. It states that the privacy policy now contains more words than the US constitution.

The article also mentioned that the Google search term for ‘delete my Facebook account’ has also increased which suggests that there are many people out there unhappy with the way Facebook is handling privacy.

I think as many people have mentioned, it really comes down to personal choice and being aware of what you are putting online and sharing with people to make sure nothing that is not wanted online doesn’t go online.

To read the artcile in today’s SMH follow this link: http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/digital-life-news/facebook-founder-feels-the-heat-as-privacy-backlash-rages-20100514-v38t.html

Sydney Morning Herald. (2010). Facebook Privacy Outrage. Retrieved May 14, 2010 from http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/digital-life-news/facebook-founder-feels-the-heat-as-privacy-backlash-rages-20100514-v38t.html
Written by PeterP about 2 years ago. Reply

Hi Samantha
Well written and structured paper. I have mentioned on a few other posts about the way Facebook has structured it security settings and how they should default to the most secure and then let individuals select which setting they will allow rather than the opposite where they allow everything and let individuals decide which setting they should secure. But as this is not in facebooks best interests it will never happen. In your conclusion you mentioned that the best strategy is to “exercise judgment in what personal information we choose to post”. I agree 100% with this statement however have found through experience that teenagers (in particular) judgment is sometimes poor so the support and education that you mentioned plays a much more important role where the young are involved.
- Written by Samantha about 2 years ago. Reply
  
  Thanks Peter – it would be interesting to know if highschools have SNS issue awareness and education in their IT curricula ….
Written by JasonK about 2 years ago. Reply

Good paper explaining and highlighting the privacy issues with SNS’s. Very much in-line with my own paper, especially regarding the open defaults inherent within Facebook.

One thing I should point out though, is that Zuckerberg never said “Privacy is dead”. This is just what was inferred from the speach that he made at the Crunchie awards in San Francisco. What he actually said according to Johnson (2010) was,

“People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people,” he said. “That social norm is just something that has evolved over time.”

What is really annoying is that Facebook has made all these privacy changes to users accounts and therefore it has become the norm. Upon reading this statement from Zuckerberg, you might assume that somehow magically people just decided to stop caring about privacy, but this isn’t true.

Like you also pointed out, the privacy settings are too complicated and difficult to understand. In my paper I also make the same conclusion because according to Bonneau & Preibush (2009, p19), “…found that 24% of Facebook users did not understand the implications of their own privacy settings”. This finding is backed up by another study of college students which found that between 20% and 30% were not able to understand how the Privacy Settings in Facebook functioned, nor how to make changes to it (Grimmelmann, 2009).

The problem with SNS’s is also the privacy paradox that results from our desire to share and exchange information via socializing, but at the same time keep information private. The open defaults inherent within Facebook immediately place all information out there to Everyone and makes privacy null and void.

I really enjoyed reading your paper and your argument is sound, valid and well referenced, and accurate. Hopefully people will soon wake up the scam that Facebook has become – from legitimate SNS’s to a simple marketing database for advertisers which requires weak privacy to function properly.

Bonneau, J. & Preibusch, S. (2009). The privacy jungle: on the market for data protection in social networks. WEIS 2009: The eighth workshop on the economics of information security. Retrieved from http://preibusch.de/publications/Bonneau_Preibusch__Privacy_Jungle__2009-05-26.pdf

Grimmelmann, J. (2009). Saving Facebook. Iowa Law Review, 94, 1137-1160, Retrieved from http://www.law.uiowa.edu/journals/ilr/Issue%20PDFs/ILR_94-4_Grimmelmann.pdf

Jonson, B. (2010, January 11). Privacy no longer a social norm, says Facebook founder. GaurdianUK. Retrieved from http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/jan/11/facebook-privacy
Written by PaulaB about 2 years ago. Reply

Hi Samantha, what an interesting paper you are presenting on this site, covering few important areas of social networking.

Let me touch the privacy settings. According to recent news (International Herald Tribute, 7 May 2010 – I am currently in Paris, and this is an only newspaper in English I got hold off) the Facebook’s privacy setting is getting more complicated to an average users and Facebook again breached privacy issues with enabling access to private user areas. Perhaps that is why many users just stick to default setting that their main focus is to get to Facebook and communicate and privacy issue may take a secondary priority. I also read about an ‘expert’ testing reaction from public by posting info about particular party creating ‘gatecrushing’ that police had to be called. The person who posted the message on Facebook just wanted to test how fast the news can travel…..he succeeded but it caused real problem. There is no such protection against malicious postings on Facebook that can be more damaging then releasing private info for example having affair with best friends boyfriend. What are your thoughts on this one?

cheers
Paula
- Written by Samantha about 2 years ago. Reply
  
  Hi Paula
  
  There is alot of discussion about how Facebook should be policing what is posted, but if you consider the following …
  
  Population of Australia? About 21.5 million (from http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/0/1647509ef7e25faaca2568a900154b63?OpenDocument)
  
  Population of United States? About 309 million (from http://www.census.gov/main/www/popclock.html)
  
  Population of FB? Over 400 million (from http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=287542162130)
  
  Employees of FB? 1,200+ (from http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics#!/press/info.php?factsheet)
  
  … we just can’t expect Facebook to police posted content. I don’t know what a solution would be, unless SNS’s start governing like countries …..
Written by Mandy Burke about 2 years ago. Reply

Hi Samantha,

Congratulations on a very well written and researched paper. I really enjoyed reading it!

I think privacy is an issue that most people do not address when on social networking sites because as you say they are either not aware of the effects or they are too lazy to think about it. I often wonder whether I am so worried about my digital footprint just because I am interesting in SNSs and are aware of the privacy implications. Someone logging on to Facebook each day and watching the nightly news may not be exposed to the issues of Facebook’s set up and therefore not know what is lurking on Google!

Thanks for a great read!

Mandy
Written by TomEvans about 2 years ago. Reply

Hi Samantha,

Thanks for a very really good paper.

I am interested in your explanation about why social network site users reveal so much personal information about themselves online. I agree that some of this is because they are encouraged to do so by the site architects; also that some people lack understanding of the privacy issue and how to control what is publicly available via privacy settings and that some people may be lured into feeling safe because they are posting messages from the security of their own bedrooms. But I think your point about the ‘invisible audience’ is a good one. People are aware that their Facebook pages may be read by others, but since visitors to their page do not have to leave a calling card, there is no way for them to know who has accessed their page or why. This doesn’t allow them to judge their own comfort about who knows what about them. As you say, we choose to reveal aspects of ourselves to people depending how close or distant we feel to them. SN sites takes away that capacity. There may also be a false security in believing that there is safety in numbers and that being one of millions means that they too are invisible.

On another subject, I wonder what ‘kickback’ Facebook earns for sharing the data collected on their site with marketing companies.
Written by waisitham about 2 years ago. Reply

Well written paper Samantha and very interesting research done on it.

I find it rather interesting that 80% of these social networking sites new users stick to the default settings set by these sites. It is important to keep our awareness level up towards these privacy settings as it can lead to stalking which can be harmful to anyone who posts up valuable personal information on these social networking sites.

This I believe is related to my paper and can be found here: http://networkconference.netstudies.org/2010/04/social-networking-sites-have-taken-certain-stances-to-support-stalking/

My paper discusses the certain aspects that have led SNSs to support stalking.
Written by jhiroberts about 2 years ago. Reply

HI Samantha,

I really enjoyed reading your paper.

It was well researched and presented.

Like your own paper, my paper also explores social networking and privacy issues. My paper however only concentrates on Facebook.

In my paper I also recommend more education, and a greater understanding of the implications of social networking.

I would be interested to hear your thoughts on if you think Facebook, and other social networking sites also have a part to play in privacy. As your paper was more focused on the personal.

Thanks again for a great read.

Cheers

Jhi

http://networkconference.netstudies.org/2010/04/facebook-and-the-demise-of-individual-privacy-%E2%80%93-a-flawed-assumption-or-serial-disregard/
Written by Jiawen Lin about 2 years ago. Reply

Hi Samantha, your paper is really interesting to me on privacy issue as I think privacy is a big concern when using social network sites. You mentioned that the privacy default setting is one of the reasons that users reveal much personal information. Goettke and Christiana (2007) mention that a lot of social network sites do not provide sufficient privacy protection in their default settings. Goettke and Christiana (2007, p. 9) also state that “many users want to protect themselves but are not fully informed or educated about how to change privacy settings on these social networking sites”. This is a serious problem, especially for young users. I have mentioned the dangers of teenagers using social network sites in my paper http://networkconference.netstudies.org/2010/04/identity-and-privacy-concerns-in-teenagers%e2%80%99-online-social-network/

You conclude that “Awareness is key to solving the privacy problem”. I agree with you and I believe that Internet users are responsible for their own privacy protection. I am interested to know more about what the dangers of giving out personal information are and how users’ privacy awareness can be increase?

Reference:
Goettke, R., & Christiana, J. (2007). Privacy and Online Social Networking Websites. Paper presented at the Computer Science 199r: Special Topics in Computer Science Computation and Society: Privacy and Technology. http://www.eecs.harvard.edu/cs199r/fp/RichJoe.pdf
Written by KayeE about 2 years ago. Reply

Great paper Samantha. Lots of ties here with our online identity and how we are portrayed to others through what we do online. The Woods (2007) article had some great information on why some people are not concerned with privacy. It suggested that a lot of it comes down to age and that the younger generation have different attitudes to posting information online. I know that they are not concerned about this at the moment – but I do wonder if one day they will. We all regret things that we say at times – but no one is following us around and recording our comments. However, those impulsive comments or photos that we post online cross the line of temporal to something far more permanent and with sometimes complex complications. I wrote about some of these complications in my paper – http://networkconference.netstudies.org/2010/04/a-virtual-collision-when-your-private-and-professional-worlds-clash/

I wholeheartedly agree with your final statement that the “best strategy is simply to exercise judgment in what personal information we choose to post”. It all comes down to this – we need to think before we post!

Woods, R. (2010). Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg says privacy is dead. So why does he want to keep this picture hidden? The Sunday Times, January 17, 2010. Retrieved March 18, 2010, from http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article6991010.ece
Written by Hans about 2 years ago. Reply

Comment on: But My Post was Private! Why We Can’t Assume Privacy on Social Network Sites by Samantha Warren

Like others before me Samantha, a great read and one that was of particular interest to me. Several years ago in my role as president of a National Cycling Club, I got to write a column in the quarterly magazine. On this particular occasion I suggested that we all should do a Google search on our name to see what information was in cyberspace. To my surprise I found one or two items that I never imagined would appear. I was not ashamed by the items, just surprised. Since then I have remained vigilant about what I say and publish, not just on social networking sites, but also in general.

In the Melbourne Age this morning (May 7) there was an article by Michael Pearce, president of Liberty Victoria, Deveny’s demise another cautionary tale in the twitter Age. I do not want to go into the details of Deveny’s tweets, but rather to make the point as Pearce does, “ if she had said those things to people on her table ,it is unlikely to have gone any further than the confines of the event (Pearce, 2010).

He also tells the story of US president Franklin Roosevelt from the 1930s and 1940s. The president suffered from polio and “was confined to a wheelchair, except for public appearances when he would stand with discrete assistance.
This was never publicly disclosed during the term of his presidency. Indeed, on one occasion he fell to the ground in front of the entire Washington press corps. Not one photograph was taken of the stricken president sprawling helplessly before the throng. The photographers rightly judged it to be private and to be irrelevant to his performance as president.”. (Pearce, 2010)

The question quite rightly in my view is how much do we need to adjust our ideas of privacy? Or is it possible to create our own private space that cannot be invaded by technology?

Pearce, M. (2010, May 7). Deveny’s demise another cationary tale in the Twitter age. The Age. Retrieved from http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/devenys-demise-another-cautionary-tale-in-the-twitter-age-20100506-ugsn.html
Written by Sharlene about 2 years ago. Reply

Hi Samantha,

This is a great and interesting paper to read. I also find it interesting that when facebook was originally constructed all the default settings were set to private and eventually these default settings changed to public default settings. I assume that Mark Zuckerberg and his affliation with third party providers to provide them with information about your profile so you can be targeted for marketing, may have something to do with it. I think it is important for people to take into consideration that the majority of SNS are businesses and Mark Zuckerberg is making a large amount of money from this so called free social networking site.
I also found it interesting that Mark was quoted in your paper saying “people have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people – and that social norm is just something that has evolved over time” (McCullagh, 2010), when research shows that the highest proportion of growth in facebook has occurred with people 35 and older. Are they more comfortable now with sharing information and are tying in with the social norm?
- Written by Samantha about 2 years ago. Reply
  
  Hi Sharlene
  
  I don’t think that people are necessarily more comfortable sharing more online, I think it’s the commodification of the information that is creating the ’social norm’ ie the social network sites are making it happen for money – when have any of the private to public policy changes been made due to popular demand? They have all been decided by the SNS’s and then the users have had to adapt …. and still we use them
Written by AaronMillerand about 2 years ago. Reply

Hi Samantha, thanks for an enjoyable and thought-provoking paper. Like a few others before me, I was particularly intrigued by the concept of “power of default” and the fact that 80% of people don’t change their visibility settings. I agree with your point that people are often confused when signing up to a SNS such as Facebook. In addition to people not bothering to change their settings, I believe the complication of the process is also a contributing factor. For example, in Facebook you are given a myriad of options to customise the privacy settings on your account. This would be quite daunting and confusing, especially to those who may not have much knowledge about computers and privacy settings.

Thanks again for your paper, you have definitely made me think about the information I divulge in my profiles! Aaron.
- Written by Samantha about 2 years ago. Reply
  
  The power of default is strong – facebooks privacy policies are changed without notice, and the only way to make sure you’re on top of them is to wade through them all regularly – I check my Facebook privacy settings every couple of weeks! Sometimes I think it would be easier to just leave it and ignore it, but the papers from this conference and the readings for the unit have really opened my eyes! It’s actually a bit scary, how much info is revealed online, but I really like facebook!! It is a conundrum ….
Written by JenQuinn about 2 years ago. Reply

Great paper! You’ve demonstrated alot of really important issues regarding SNS’s and privacy. I really liked your discussion on the ‘power of the default’, and I find it extremely scary that “in 80% of cases, however, users will stick with these default settings”. That is a frightening statistic and one that will be making me obsessively check my profile privacy settings, just to make sure the ‘power of the default’ is not present!

Thanks for a great read
Written by Sky about 2 years ago. Reply

An interesting paper, and a very topical issue! I do wonder if you think there’s any room for consumer activism on privacy? Or is Tim Spalding right when he says that users of social networking sites are ‘products’ instead of ‘customers’ (quoted on BoingBoing)?
- Written by Samantha about 2 years ago. Reply
  
  Hi Sky
  
  I’ll quote directly from Peterson (2009) – it explains one of the major problems with regards to consumer activism…
  
  “If users don’t like Facebook’s privacy policies, a cyberlibertarian might say, they can walk. No intervention necessary. Don’t like the tools Stanley makes? Buy Black and Decker. Problem solved.”
  
  “Choosing between social networks, however, is nothing like choosing between drills, or cars, or washing machines. People choose social network sites not by the technology but, as danah boyd notes, by “where [their] friends are.”……The extraordinarily high transaction costs of porting one’s data and contacts between social network sites locks users into Facebook, “empowers the site owner and disempowers the user,” …..”
  
  “The lack of meaningful competition, data portability, or usable privacy settings means that the only effective “market” solution to Facebook privacy problems is to deactivate one’s account, an untenable option for the digital natives who rely on Facebook to build social capital. Many users find Facebook to be as socially indispensable as email or the telephone, meaning they “will put up with a bad deal rather than make the effort
  of replicating all their personal data and ‘friends” connections elsewhere.” “
Written by Michael N about 2 years ago. Reply

Samantha well written and expressed and I agree with your aguement. I do think society is becoming relaxed about what is written. Maybe it is the changing morality of the society; for example, Lamebook shows many amusing and offensive texts and images but even though the identities are suppressed, people will still post things such as “I hate that so and so” or discribe personal things such as body functions.

However, I think in terms of an employer seeing any material the problem has become an instant reaction to the nature of the posting. As Peterson (2009) describes the sacking for the use of the word “boring” I would as an employer be less concerned and want to address the underlying reason rather than be a drama king and just be insulted and sack on the spot. I would be more concerned if something about the employer or another employee was posted. The point is, things should be check and I feel that there are, typically media driven, inaccurate stories about facts. Granted, there must be control and management over what is written, and it depends on your ambition and loyality to the company, but I do not like the idea of total censorship. Maybe it is because people just feel saying it on a site is ok and it is private, but your paper refutes this. That is a good thing.

But is it ok for ex employees to say things about their employer in SNS. Looking at this link
http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=4940146588&topic=14262 where ex employees of Telstra disclose things that happened, can a company do something about those that have left? Telstra has last year given their employees rules as to behaving on SNS (Oakes, 2009).
When I worked for Telstra in the 90’s we were told not to libel the company or staff. I have mixed feelings about it, I know it is wise to support the hand that feeds one, but I do not think any company has the total right to tell you what to write about them. But within reason and your paper backs that up indirectly.

Maybe we will see more organisations put out social media policy use has Dawson (2009) reported last year which can benefit the organisation. But again I feel that if too much censoring goes on and you are judged on a post, to me without checking facts with the one who did it first, it amounts to discrimination, but also protection of reputation is understandable from the owners point of view. Let’s hope a balance can be struck.

Dawson, R. (2009). Telstra releases social media policy: it’s time for organizations to get their act together. Ross Dawson Blog. Retrieved 3 May, 2010 from http://rossdawsonblog.com/weblog/archives/2009/04/telstra_release.html

Oakes, D. (2009). Telstra lays down the law on Twitter. The Sydney Morning Herald Online. Retrieved 3 May, 2010, from http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/telstra-lays-down-the-law-on-twitter/2009/04/19/1240079538773.html

Peterson, C. (2009). Losing Face: An Environmental Analysis of Privacy on Facebook. Working paper. Retrieved April 1, 2010 from http://etc.cpeterson.org/research/workingpapers/2010/losingface_workingpaper.pdf
Written by HeidiN about 2 years ago. Reply

Hi Samantha,
I think your paper is very well written with good references to back up your argument. It really is amazing how “relaxed” we have become with making our personal information online available, which I believe contributes to identity theft. I am quite paranoid with the information I post online as I do almost everything on the Internet like banking and shopping. Privacy has become quite a debatable issue with SNS as there is so much available now, not to mention the multiple accounts people have online which can include anything from work related, educational and confidential material.
You mentioned “site architecture” as a reason why privacy is a concern which I feel relates to my paper and can be found here: http://networkconference.netstudies.org/2010/04/“pointing-the-finger-at-facebook-and-myspace-–-are-the-platforms-of-these-sites-to-blame”/
My paper discusses the platforms of social networking sites, Facebook and MySpace which I think contribute to the abuse of these sites, causing negative results for users. Privacy issues have the potential to cause many problems but we can also take precautions to help reduce or possibly eliminate these risks. I came across a site about “protecting your privacy on social networking sites” which may be useful: http://www.privacy.gov.au/materials/types/media/view/6219

HeidiN
- Written by Samantha about 2 years ago. Reply
  
  Hi Heidi
  
  There’s also a good video about protecting your privacy on social network sites made by the Canadian Govt – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UFW_v0G45M&feature=channel_page
  
  Thanks
  Sam
Written by janette about 2 years ago. Reply

Frankly, I am amazed at how trusting people are in how much personal information they display believing that it is hidden and private.

It is frightening how little it takes to pull up the personal details, habits, friends, etc., of a person who believes they have successfully hidden their identity online.

Once we get inside that “bounded system” we lose control over our information/identity. And, as you say, it is impossible to erase the information once it has been posted.

It certainly does appear that “people have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people – and that social norm is just something that has evolved over time”.

The potential for stalking and identity theft is frightening.

The only way to keep anything private these days is to keep it to yourself both online and offline.
Written by Lee-Ann Khoh about 2 years ago. Reply

In my paper, Bullying 2.0: The Rise of Cyberbullying, I wrote that many people feel more confident to do things on the internet that they might not do offline. I think that definitely applies to privacy issues on social networking sites as well.

A couple of other Facebook sacking cases:
Moult, J. (2009, August 14). Woman ’sacked’ on Facebook for complaining about her boss after forgetting she had added him as a friend. Daily Mail. Retrieved May 2, 2010, from http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1206491/Woman-sacked-Facebook-boss-insult-forgetting-added-friend.html
Call centre worker caught out by boss after posting ’sickie’ plan on ‘Facebook’. (2008, October 23). Daily Mail. Retrieved May 2, 2010, from http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1080010/Call-centre-worker-caught-boss-posting-sickie-plan-Facebook.html

Of course we need to be smarter and more careful in this brave new world we live in and education is important; that’s just the reality of the internet age. But I think the ethical issue is worth debating nonetheless. To what extent “should” the things you do or say on a SNS outside of work be grounds for dismissal? To what extent “should” a company investigate a potential employee’s digital footprint?
- Written by Samantha about 2 years ago. Reply
  
  Personally, I don’t think someone should be sacked because they made a disparaging comment about their boss, but people do really need to be careful about what they post (I hope she learnt from the experience…). The other question is, should her boss have posted a reply, or should he have talked to her about it at work?
Written by Taraeta about 2 years ago. Reply

Hi Samantha

The quote by Peterson (2009) certainly highlights the dangers associated with online social networking and accepting or initiating friend requests with work colleagues. I find the aspect of privacy on social networking interesting as work colleagues attempt to friend other work colleagues, thus leading to an individual censoring what they place on Facebook and ensuring that friends don’t post inappropriate content. Can you provide any more information on how the impact of the 2009 reforms relating to user content have impacted on current users in comparison to Facebook’s 2005 privacy policy?

Taraeta
Written by Belindam about 2 years ago. Reply

You raise some important points and I tend to agree some people do underestimate the reach of sites like Facebook. There also seems to be a belief that just because users can change things in their profile, that these changes somehow negate anything that existed before, as if it has suddenly evaporated into thin air.

Do we all need to guard ourselves online, just as we do in real life? Do we approach online communication as if the boss or our mothers are going to read it? Some free speech!
Given that the idea of online social networks means ‘visible-networks’, I sometimes wonder if the whole concept of privacy online has been completely altered, or if it ever really existed in the first place.
Written by ESutton about 2 years ago. Reply

I’ve really enjoyed reading your paper and agree that users underestimate the need for appropriate identity management. They assume because their Friends are on Facebook that they can post these details up without fear of identity theft, fraud or attack, but forget that there are four main principles that govern content online. Persistance, searchability, replicability and the invisible audience (boyd, 2007, pp. 2-3). These issues create problems when, as the example you used shows, users link their multiple identities and accounts online and it creates a trail of identity. So even though the user might not have posted all their information in one platform, when you look across multiple platforms you can gather a very clear picture about the users identity. For marketers, this kind of access and the opt-out nature of Facebook, are a dream for data mining and the commodification of our personal details.

I talk about identity management in my paper in regards to the need to separate our identities online to ensure that we don’t leave an identity trail for people to follow. Because as we both discussed in our papers we represent ourselves differently online and offline, based on the social context of the situation. People need to be made more aware of the dangers posed by not undertaking even the most basic identity management skills and shown the real life ramifications of their actions.

If you’re interested my paper can be found here: http://networkconference.netstudies.org/2010/04/multifaceted-identities/

boyd, D. (2007). Social network sites: public, private, or what? Knowledge Tree, 13. Retrieved from http://kt.flexiblelearning.net.au/tkt2007/?page_id=28

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