Social Networking and Privacy
A Social Networking Site (SNS) is a web-based service that allows an individual to:
1. Create a public profile or description about him or herself that can be viewed within a bounded or controlled system;
2. Create a list of other users with whom they share a connection; and
3. View and interact with others through web-chat, uploading of photos and messaging.
Social Networking Sites allow their users to communicate and ‘keep in touch’ with each other no matter where they may be, so long as you have an internet access point!
After joining a Social Networking Site, the new user is asked to fill out forms containing a series of questions, the answers to which provides the information for a profile of that user. Typical questions include age, location, interests and an ‘about me’ section. Most sites encourage users to upload a profile photo and you can enhance your profile by adding multimedia content or changing your profile’s look. Facebook, for example, allows a user to add modules or applications that enhance their profile.
The visibility of a profile varies by site and according to user judgement and caution. Profiles on Friendster and Tribe.net for example are crawled by search engines, making them visible to anyone, whether or not the viewer has an account. On the other hand, sites like MySpace allow users to choose whether they want their profile to be public or ‘Friends Only’.
After joining a Social Networking Site, users are encouraged to identify others on the site with whom they have a relationship, regardless of whether they are work colleagues, school friends or mere acquaintances – the label of these people ranges from ‘friends’ to ‘contacts’ or ‘fans’. Most of these sites require the user to send out an initial contact to the other user, generally called a ‘friendship request’, and the recipient can either accept or reject the request. If rejected, you are unable to view that person’s profile page.
A crucial aspect of Social Networking Sites is the public display of an individual users connections or ‘Friends List’. The list contains links to each friend’s profile and enables the viewer to pass through the site by clicking on each friend’s profile. On most sites, the list of friends is only visible to those permitted to view the profile; normally you have to be an accepted friend of that person to view their friends list.
Most Social Networking Sites provide a means for users to leave messages on a friends’ profile page as well as providing a private messaging service, similar to standard email. In addition to this, most sites have photo-sharing and video-sharing capabilities, whereby users can tag or label those they recognise within the photo or video.