Use of Social Media Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Use of Social Media - Research Paper Example This paper tells that social media has been flagged as a potential threat if used inappropriately. Issues of privacy, unnecessary information, negative influence, devaluation of human values are some of the negative issues associated with social media. For proper utilization of social media, governments should take control on managing social media so that issues like privacy, dangerous outcomes, and endless distractions can be maintained. Certainly, social media connects millions of people across the world. Among these people are genuine users as well as hackers and other malicious identities. Social media such as Facebook is a good avenue for accessing a large pool of people of all kinds. This makes it an attractive haven for any person with personal interests. For instance, politicians have often used social media to propagate their political ideologies some of which may trigger hatred among the target groups. North Africa an Arabian region revolution that began in Tunisia is a goo d example of overwhelming political usage of social media. Advertisers and business entities are always crawling through social media in search for opportunity to exploit. Whereas everybody is looking at an opportunity to benefit themselves, it poses a serious privacy risks to social media users. Certainly, â€Å"Breaches of privacy and security are frequently mentioned topics and so is identity theft, online bullying, and disclosure of potentially damaging or embarrassing personal information† (Shneiderman et al, 2011).  Perhaps one of the most potentially dangerous technologies is social media. Due to the high degree of penetration, wide usage, freedom, anonymity, and interconnectivity, social media is potentially dangerous if not properly regulated. Politically, social media, particularly Facebook, has been a prime platform for the propagation of political and religious views. It does not come by surprise that the recent revolution in Tunisia, Egypt, and other Islamic co untries was made possible by social media. The hazardous nature of social media stems from the fact that it supports anonymity. People have different thoughts and ideologies that they would like others to adopt. Whereas some people have well-meaning ideologies, others such as extremists, pose a danger to the population. According to Shneiderman et al (2011), â€Å"the potential for more polarized discussions as users selectively view only materials aligned with their world view and scientists retreat to narrow research topics.† Terrorists have also been using social media platforms to propagate their ideologies. In order to protect users of social media against uncontrolled use, the relevant authorities need to put measures into place (Madhava, 2011). For example, it may be necessary and important for all social media platforms to keep electronic and retrievable copies of all web activities. This way, it would be easy for the relevant authorities to keep track of potentially harmful use. Additionally, user information may be required to be incorporated within the usage of the media platforms so that users can be held accountable for wrongful use of social media.