Internet Users Become More Aware of their Privacy

The picture of internet users is changing as they become more concerned about their privacy. To see how it is, researches and studies are being conducted by different entities. Once this is done, there will be a profile of how users view or feel about their social networking activities. Pew Internet & American Life Project participated in this endeavor and reported its findings. Among others, it said that social networking sites users are becoming more careful when accepting a friend. Unlike before, they are taking more time to find out which contents must be deleted on their pages.

Pew also discovered that two out of three of all internet users have active social networking accounts. In 2009, the figures revealed that more individuals decided to delete some “friends” from their lists. When compared by gender, more women than men did so. By age, more young people tend to do the same than older ones. These findings were gathered in a span of one year.

An Associated Press insider said that users have shifted from being passive to being more conscious about other people’s comments. There are an increasing number of users who deleted comments on their profiles. Pew also mentioned that a large number of users “untagged” themselves from photos that they find “unsafe”. This tends to show that they want to stay on the “safe” side, not like in the past.

The profile options of whether to make it “public” or “private” are also useful to users. Only twenty percent have set their profiles to public, while fifty-eight percent set theirs to private. With this, more users want their profiles to be viewed only by friends. It is expected that the percentage of users who find it difficult to manage their privacy will decrease. At present, 49% said that they can manage their privacy without any trouble. This means that more social networking users are placing stricter limits on their privacy.

For the Obama administration, improved and stronger privacy protection for users of social networking sites is needed. Considering that technology for tracking users is becoming more sophisticated, there is a need for control and regulation. If this is not done, this technology is a threat to the privacy concern of users.

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