Personal Privacy & the Internet
Posted on : 21-09-2009 | By : Erika Marie | In : Technology
Tags: AOL, Facebook, Google, internet, LiveJournal, MySpace, personal privacy, predators, Social Networking, stalkers
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Back in the days of AOL profiles when no one really knew who we were, there wasn’t much issue with Internet Privacy. I’m not referring to unsecure sites asking for your credit card number, but sites like MySpace, Facebook and the like. It seems everyone under 30, and even some senior citizens have at least one profile of the two major Social Networking Sites. These sites show your personal lives laid out in a neat little page for all, or few to see. They tell where you work, where you live, phone numbers, etc. Facebook, a stalker’s dream even tells you when someone is going through relationship problems. My favorite is “it’s complicated.” 
Part of me really enjoys the attention I receive from friends commenting on what I’m doing that day, my vacation, and new photos. These are people I would otherwise probably not talk to ever again if I hadn’t found them searching for old friends and classmates. I was never much of a social butterfly, and these sites allow me to socialize without being in a crowded room of people where I would likely have a panic attack and try desperately to fade into the background.
Then there are those I don’t know all that well. Friends I met via internet forums, through other friends, and maybe a few that fell in the cracks whom I don’t even know from Adam – all able to see where I’m going this weekend, and how dirty my floors are from the photos of my pit bull puppy, Lily. How much do I really want them to know?
I pick and choose who gets to see what. I’ll never let most of you into my private LiveJournal, and even if you try to send me a friend request on my Facebook, I can promise you I will undoubtedly not accept. These are places reserved for my closest friends, family. Perhaps I will create a separate MySpace and Facebook profile if any of you request me to do so. Until then, I’d like some of who I am to remain private.
The problem with letting strangers in is that you will inevitably get “haters.” Most people don’t tell you their skeletons but in the past, I’ve let it all out, freely. It bit me in the rear very quickly. I was young and I suppose I was seeking attention; however, I didn’t estimate how much negative attention I would actually get. I let people get to me and wore my emotions on my sleeve for all to see. Clearly, a rookie mistake. I withdrew to avoid the attention and after all was said and done, years went by and the negative attention almost ceases to exist. This time around, I’ve got other plans.
Some people are afraid of internet predators and psycho stalkers. Yeah, I’ve had my share of stalkers. I even dated one. Those psycho stalkers are somebody’s next-door neighbor. Just because you met them on the internet doesn’t make them any more psycho.
So, my question to the readers (however few I may have at this point) is: How secure do you feel having your personal business strewn all over the internet? Would you be afraid if your boss or your mother Googled you? What do you do to separate the internet from everyday reality, or has the internet become your reality?
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im generaly not scared of what people will find when the google my name, and i try to stay away from sites like MySpace or anything of that sort.
Why is it that you’re staying away from those sites?
I’m not sure I really make a distinction per se between ‘internet’ and reality. It’s not like the people out there are figments of my imagination or anything. I just play my cards close to my chest. I’m also not really online to make friends – I get into discussions for the discussion’s sake. Some stuff gets out, but unless I can account for each and every person it’s getting out to, I limit certain details.
But then I do the whole compartamentalization of data and ‘need to know’ thing in the physical world too. My acquaintances generally have highly unofficial ‘access levels’. This means that a lot of my co-workers have thought me to be a standoffish jerk, particularly in offices where the ethos was that just because everyone worked together they were all FRIENDS.
I kind of skipped the whole trendy ‘social networking’ thing for that reason. Well, until a month ago. I FINALLY got Facebook, on account that just about everyone I know has it. It wasn’t so much to meet people, as to help keep track of the ones I already know, who are scattered liberally across the continent and occasionally further. Ultimately I joined a few groups (generally relating to local cultural goings-on, political organizations, etc). But I keep my privacy settings on maximum, and I don’t really use the groups to find friends, or even talk much, so much as I do to get updates on upcoming symphony performances.
I completely passed on Livejournal, despite vigorous encouragement of friends of mine. I just didn’t feel any pressing need to tell everyone what I was up to.
I wouldn’t be alarmed if my mom googled me. The only stuff she’d find that’s directly linkable is within her access level. Ditto for a boss. And frankly, they’d have a tricky time finding that.
So I guess I’m just kind of private. Except when I’m not. I mean, sometimes I DO make friends online. Hell, probably the best relationship of my life started online with us exchanging high-velocity depleted uranium and particle beam fire on a regular basis in a deeply nerdy strategy game environment (it used ascii graphics!). It’s not like we fell for each other online, though – that happened years later in the flesh. And it’s not like we let each other into our lives with any real haste either – that took many months and a simulated body count which made the Battle of the Somme look downright placid.
I really don’t see a difference between real life and reality either. Some of my best friends in the entire world are girls I met online when I was 16. We still keep in touch constantly, mostly through LiveJournal.
I’m reminded of a quote from a conversation with the girl referenced in the last paragraph.
She joked, “I’m not sure I should talk voice with a strange guy from the internet.”
I replied, “If it’s any help, I assure you that I am equally strange when I’m not on the internet.”
I’m doing work in a field where ones life is put on display. I put my stuff on sites because I’d rather be doing it myself than waiting for someone to put it out there about me.
This is a good point.
hahahaha