How Your Online Presence Affects You Personally
Ever wonder how pictures will pop up on your social media feed and it would be about something you were just talking about with your friends, like food or a certain music band? Well, it's not just a coincidence that it just so happens to appear on your phone the second you were finished talking about it. Companies like Facebook and Google infringe upon your privacy and collect countless amounts of demographics to further your interest in what you were speaking about. However, their true intention isn't to actually help you out or further your thoughts, it is to gain more data users, take your money, and invade your privacy. Invasion of privacy is a serious issue that many people are unaware of, and is most dominant in the technology realm and more specifically, social media. I believe many people who are social media users do not understand how much of their privacy is truly invaded and everything they post is seen by all companies and even the government. On a website called Fast Company, there was an article posted about a man who was an executive for a big ad company who began realizing how scary this issue truly is. His name is Richard and he is trying to inform people across the world of how ad agencies and big companies like this invade our privacy without any of us knowing. He gives an example about a woman who, at first, they had no idea who she was, but with a few clicks here and there they were able to figure out her whole morning routine, how she has a child, and where she lives. All based off of her cell phone- something that a vast majority of the world's population owns. The thought of any company being able to track you down and knowing your every move just because of your cell phone is scary, and needs to be made more aware of.
I didn't think much about my online presence because I just thought that since my accounts were private nobody would be able to see what I post unless I allow them. I was wrong. It doesn't matter if your accounts are made private or public, big cooperate companies can trace any data, specific servers, and really intrude upon your entire life. The social media accounts I am most active on are Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook and my following consists of people I know; however, it comes to my attention and hopefully yours too that private accounts don't mean anything. I stay away from posting personal information out on my social media accounts like my phone number and such, but I do post about what I'm doing, where I am like a sunflower field or at school, and post small updates about my life on Facebook for my family to see. Even though I'm not posting personal information that the internet should not see, I am still posting about my every day life that could be a issue. I saw this image while looking into data privacy and it perfectly shows which big companies are behind this problem.
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