Social Media – The Good, The Bad and the 'Not-So-Private'

I am a part of a social networking website. It allows me to communicate with my friends and family that I do not see too often. An example would be if I wanted to wish my cousin happy birthday, I wouldn’t have to pick up the phone, I could just send them a quick message on Facebook.

When I first made my twitter account for example, I made sure that not just anyone could see what I was saying. Right now, my twitter account is still private so that only people that I allow to follow me can see what I tweet.

I make sure not to post where I am, my age, the school I go to etc. Even though my account is protected, I don’t want to take a chance. Sometimes it’s hard not to mention these types of information online but that just goes to show how aware you must be when using social networking websites.

Things such as your first name, hobbies, and your age are examples of information that are quite safe to post. Things that aren’t safe to post are information such as your last name, your date of birth, any credit card information, your school etc. It is important not to post these types of information online. Allowing others to see this can harm you in many ways.

To become more responsible users of social networking websites, we must remember that the words and images that we post on the internet can be available for many years. Your future employers, school admission officials, identity thieves, spammers and stalkers could also see this information. It is important to watch what we post online because it could possible affect our futures tremendously.