Technology and Privacy

New media technology has created new possibilities for the invasion of privacy. Recent advances in technology has grealty expanded our ability to acquire private and confidential information as well as access to public records.

Web 2.0 has made it possible for internet users to pay bills online with a credit card number, or a routing and checking account number. We can also shop online, where our purchases are shipped right to our homes or work. When we visit or register at particular websites, they ask us for our personal information such as, physical address, phone number, email, birthday, whether we are married or single, male or female. And in turn they give our email addresses to other companies, who then try to sell us their product. With all of the personal information that websites require, does this make you worry about your personal identity and privacy?

For some people, having to give out so much personal information worries them, and for others they think that they would rather have all of their personal information stored in a computer, because they feel their personal information is more protected, and only the computer sees it. I agree and disagree with both of these answers. Whenever I go onto a website and have to give them my personal information to register, I will make up a fake name, address, and birthday, because I don't think that is any of their business. So in some sense I don't think my personal information is safer on a computer. What about people who hack into companies systems and take information and then in turn steal their identity? At the same time it makes me, and I am sure other citizens feel safer in terms of personal identity knowing that they are the only one who knows certain information, and it is harder for their identity to be stolen or their personal information to be released.

Chatting, texting, blogging, and spending time on facebook, myspace, twitter, etc... are part of everyday life for millions of people. On social networking sites, most of us post information about ourselves to stay in touch with friends and family. Most users of social networking sites see thier personal sites as private, when in reality, many of them can be seen by friends, employers, officials, parents, siblings, and more. Because it is so easy to access information about people on social networking sites and google, does this benefit or have a disadvantage in interpersonal relationships? To some extent its beneficial, but at the same time do you feel that your privacy is being invaded by people who you possibly don't even know?

Today, 22% of employers will check to see if the potential person they are looking to hire has a facebook, or a myspace, and look at their profiles to get a better idea of who this person is. Would this action be considered an invasion of privacy? Is it ethical for employers to do this? Yesterday at my job, I was listening to a conversation that was going on about facebook between two of the people that I work with. One of the persons is older and was asking the other person about facebook and the whole concept of uploading pictures. One of the questions asked was, what makes people think that the people who are in the picture want a picture of them on the internet? Should they ask permission if its okay to put the picture up? In the reading, "Privacy and Technolgy" by Gary T. Marx he says that, ""Privacy is a resource in inter-personal relations, doled out and exchanged as relationships progress. "

A typical view held by many citizens in the United States have the assertion of, "the more you know about somebody else, the better off everybody is" It seems like now with all of the social networking sites you can a pretty good idea of who a person is, and how they live their live just by looking at their profile. However, is this statement true? Do you really think you have the right to know everything about the people you interact with? Does this statement make the American ideal of privacy not relevant?

Everyday, its more common to hear a story about somebody's identity being stolen, as a result of their information on the internet. Today, it so easy for someone who is computer savy to hack into a sysytem and steal banking information, social security numbers, and get personal information that is supossed to be secure. I work at an insurance office and at least once a week there is someone who calls in that needs to change their bank account information because of fraud or their identity being stolen. Is there something more that can be done to secure business' systems other than a downloadable program?

In the future, I hope that there will be some kind of new technology that will help secure privacy, so that we feel safe about the content that computer sysytems hold, in terms of privacy. But until then, we can be cautious as to the type of content that we post on the internet for everyone to see, as well as updating secutity settings, and monitoring what people post of you.