Think you've got secrets? Think again...

     Is PUBLIC the new PRIVATE?

     It seems so, given that the amount of information uploaded onto the Internet is phenomenal, with 23 billion gigabytes being added each every week. Most of us don’t give much thought to the personal information about us that is floating around cyberspace, but should we?

     McNair Ingenuity Research conducted a survey into the attitude of Australian’s towards their Internet privacy, for ABC television show Hungry Beast. It showed that 82% of web-connected Australians use Social Networking Sites (SNS). 93% of those people are on facebook. 77% of SNS users have adjusted their privacy settings, even though only 36% have actually read the privacy policy of the sites they use.

     Are we worried about our privacy? About half the participants of the survey were concerned about employers, law enforcement and government agencies having access to their online information, and 75% were concerned about advertisers. And the here’s the scary news: the more we share, the more we will be asked to share in the future. Hungry Beast explains that employers in the USA are already demanding facebook log-in details and passwords from prospective employees. Would you want your chances of getting a job impacted by the number of drunken photos in your account, or the number of status updates made during work hours?

     Well, it seems that at least some people do care about privacy. Google StreetView, which allows any Internet user to browse private property in suburban streets, caused controversy in 2010, when the government allowed it in, provided that all faces and number plates captured were blurred, as well as allowing any property owners the choice to opt out. 244,000 Germans opted out, choosing to have their property pixilated. Some people felt strongly enough about what they saw as a breach of privacy to vandalise and disable Google filming vehicles, whilst other anti-privacy activists vandalised the houses of those who had chosen to opted.

     Social media commentator, Jeff Jarvis, recognises the power of the Internet to connect people with ideas and with each other, and maintains that those who cut themselves off from the world of the Internet are invariably cutting themselves off from other people. Social media isn’t a fad – it has permanently changed the way in which we communicate. Don’t believe it? Watch this video that we were shown in class.

     This raises some serious ethical dilemmas for teachers; how do we teach responsible digital citizenship to our students? How much will we involve and encourage them to be active online? Can we be sure about what is happening to the information being collected and stored? 

     How much information about yourself are you willing to share? More to the point – how much information about yourself ARE you sharing, right now?

Thanks to Flickr for the above Image.