Reader Response draft 1

         In the article “The Perils of Over-sharing in Social Networks”, Emm (2014) talks about the ever increasing danger of using the internet. The author writes about how recent news of authorities and large corporations spying on citizens have surfaced. This problem is further exacerbated since the internet is increasing being used for almost everything, from communication to monetary transactions. Emm highlights the importance of being careful about what information we make accessible to others online as it may reach an unintended audiences with malicious motives. Such seemingly harmless information when pieced together or interpreted by the right person can inadvertently reveal a trove of information about yourself or what you post about. Emm states that these attackers are able to target any device able to connect to the internet, and people are complacent when it comes to protecting their handphones due to attacks being rare. People thus need to act with caution to protect themselves these dangers.

         The dangers of the online world shared by the author seem to be exaggerated to gain online readership. Although what he presents in his blogpost is factually true, he scares the readers into believing that they are at risk more than they actually are. He does this by introducing out of the ordinary rare situations as commonplace.

         The first idea given by Emm is regarding the government collecting data from its citizens. Emm wirtes about how “many feel uncomfortable” about this collection of information. However, my view is that for the many ordinary citizens who go about their daily lives, the government monitoring their online activities should not be alarming since we have nothing to hide. As long as the government uses these information gathered in a respectable manner, most of us have no reasons be worried. After all, this data is used to combat crimes and keep citizens safe.

         However, some will cry an invasion of privacy. In any society today, some privacy must be sacrificed to keep the majority of the population safe. All of this is however assuming that the government uses data collected in a responsible way. It has come to light that these information collected under the guise of security purposes, are sometimes used to support the government agenda by blackmailing and spying on dissidents. Since there is little we can do about the collection of information from governments and large companies, we would have to resort to using other tactics if we want to hide our online behaviour.

          In his blogpost, Emm writes about the risks of posting information on our lives online lest someone unintended abuses the information. However, how sensitive is the data the common man has access too actually? It is true that information that we make public online poses a possible threat to us, but this is heavily dramatized in the article. For example, how many of us work in key installations such as a nuclear power plant or leading research and development departments where our work is so sensitive such that there are hackers plotting and stalking these company’s employees to try exploit some information that might inadvertently be revealed? Even in these companies it is standard protocol for the management to properly brief its employees how to handle such data cautiously, thus preventing such leaks. For the rest of us who do not belong in the above category, sure that there has been news reports and instances that hackers have gained access into the company network by enticing employees to click onto links which automatically downloads a virus. But if we take a look at what the majority of people are working on, how much of what information we access can be useful to a particular someone else? And would this justify hiring a capable professional hacker to extract that information who targets at ones folly?

Tandem to that, the author talks about the consequence of oversharing. Emm uses the example of a boss reading an employees facebook page, a typical story. However, how applicable is this in our lives? To the minority population who enjoy such lives of late night parties and partake in questionable content, how many from these group are foolish enough to make such information available to their colleagues and bosses? This is certainly a problem which plagues a special few. Surely one who does such things would be more careful with what he shares online, lest he falls under scrutiny.

Emms article is dramatized perhaps to provide a getaway to our mundane lives, citing examples which are relevant to a small minority but capture the imagination of many. There is however some truth in what Emm is saying. It is true that computers are being targeted and infected with viruses at a rampant rate. However, the most malicious of viruses are usually to steal bank details, credit card numbers, or to create illegal botnets. These are a real threat to yourself and your computer, and thus keeping your computer protected and avoiding shady sites and dubious links are usually more than sufficient in keeping you safe.