The age of new media has greatly changed the definition of privacy. \u00a0With almost everything being digitized in the current state of society, people have lost a great deal of privacy because others have access to their information. \u00a0At the same time, though, people generally do not read terms and conditions and in doing so, blindly grant outside parties this access. \u00a0People agree to the privacy policy and give up their rights to privacy when checking \u201cI agree.\u201d \u00a0It is easy for companies to sneakily insert policies that give them permission to see and use information that, had people known these policies were in the terms and conditions, people would not have agreed to in the first place.<\/p>\n
Take, for instance, the Patriot Act, which gave the government permission to take surveillance of emails, information on the Internet, and cell phones in an effort to combat terrorism. \u00a0This brings to mind the kind of Big Brother state of society as expressed in George Orwell\u2019s 1984<\/i>, in which the government spies on its citizens. \u00a0It begs the question: how far is too far? \u00a0With the introduction and growth of Facebook, people have been confronted with the issue of sharing too much information that can be accessed by unwanted third parties. \u00a0Facebook also secretly changed its privacy policy, and by default, a user\u2019s information is shared with everyone.<\/p>\n
Why would the default <\/i>be to share information on Facebook with everyone? \u00a0Most users would like to share with just their friends, yet Facebook does not account for this in their default settings. \u00a0One would hope that companies have people\u2019s best interests in mind when creating user experiences, and privacy is more than a mere preference; it is a right. \u00a0It seems that new media, however, makes privacy more susceptible to being treated as an idealistic preference.<\/p>\n
Ultimately, people value different information for different reasons. \u00a0It is a personal decision to allow for certain pieces of information to be made available to others and in what ways they are available. \u00a0It is plain to see that searches are monitored, for searching for a particular product on Amazon will later prompt an ad for that product when visiting a different website. \u00a0In this way, companies are using data about our Internet habits to draw conclusions about us and act on it. \u00a0The NSA also had access to people\u2019s personal data, which shows just how many hands data can be put into without our knowledge.<\/p>\n
\u201cTerms and Conditions May Apply\u201d prompted thought about what privacy means in the age of new media. \u00a0Although Mark Zuckerberg justified some of his questionable actions by saying that he wanted to \u201ccreate a more open society,\u201d society does not necessarily want to be as open as he is suggesting. \u00a0The idea of de-anonymizing private searches takes search tracking to a whole new level that prowls farther into our personal lives. \u00a0Ultimately, privacy as we once knew it does not exist. \u00a0Now, privacy means that perhaps some <\/i>people do not have access to information, but there is a good chance that some others <\/i>do.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The age of new media has greatly changed the definition of privacy. \u00a0With almost everything being digitized in the current state of society, people have lost a great deal of privacy because others have access to their information. \u00a0At the same time, though, people generally do not read terms and conditions and in doing so, … <\/p>\n