Potential Risks, Dangers, and Privacy Issues of Social Networking Sites

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Social networking site research paper
Social media has grown in popularity over the past few years because of the ease with which it enables people to share information over short periods and long distances. While social media is useful in this perspective, issues have arisen in the recent past, questioning their overall privacy and security of user information. Facebook is one such social networking site that has come under public scrutiny for potential infringement of privacy policies, which, as alleged, resulted in the disclosure of biodata for millions of its users. The current paper presents a case study of the potential risks, dangers, and surveillance issues that users face when they join the site. Importantly, the study finds that the architectural structure of social Facebook, as it is the case with other sites, poses a potential threat to privacy and security of data.
Facebook is the largest social media site of the world based on the number of its subscribers. The popularity of Facebook, however, has overshadowed in many cases, but a few, the fact that it exposes its users to potential privacy infringement. One of the most recent cases that caught the attention of the public, the company was accused of poor privacy control systems that led to the private acquisition information of more than fifty million people by Cambridge Analytica (Ho 1). Congress asked the CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, to testify about the loss of data and outline what the company does to protect the privacy of individuals. In his defense, Zuckerberg retaliated at critics by arguing that the company was committed to promoting the security and privacy of anyone on Facebook. However, some of the arguments put in his defense were flimsy because they revealed the fact that some of its users are at risk of surveillance and possible loss of private data to third parties.
One of the most important reasons why everyone on social media, including Facebook, should be worried about their security is the fact that such sites sell advertisement space to companies. Facebook is provided for free services, which they compensate for trade-in private information with some of the largest companies around the world, and while Zuckerberg did not attest to the business of private data but agreed to sell advertisement space (Kang 1). Therefore, Facebook is a profit organization, which relies on the biodata of its users to make a profit.
The biggest threats to the security of users lie in the privacy policy and network architecture of social media sites. First, it should be acknowledged that Facebook, as does other social media sites, is committed to promoting the privacy of its users through its privacy policy. Howev...