I was enjoying the four-day Holy Week break (hahaha as if I have a 9-5 job) and a long-time friend of mine asked me for our other friend’s contact details as he was going to the U.S. for a conference. Our friend, in turn, gave me her contact details – and I posted it on our friend’s FB wall. Yikes. Luckily, she was alerted that her telephone number was plastered on the wall for everyone to see and she asked me to delete it. Crisis averted.
Ok, so I thought – how could I have done that when I’m the first to frown every time I see someone posting their contact details on the net, make sure my computer and the website are well-protected, that I only transact online with reputable vendors, and consider myself well-aware of online dangers? Remember this post I recently wrote?
According to Javelin and Strategy Research, people are most at risk of letting their guard down in terms of online security in social-networking sites and points out that the Generation Y users (those aged 19-30) are more susceptible to behaving like this “for the sake of self-expression.” (Read the full article here). While I’m pass that age range, I tend to agree. Perhaps my excitement at the thought that my friends would be seeing each other after several years and the sense that ‘I’m among friends’ that a social-networking site provides prompted me to throw caution to the wind.
The same research cites that in 2008 alone, about 10 million Americans have been victims of identity theft, amounting to $48 billion losses. I couldn’t find any statistics on the Philippines; maybe because majority of Filipinos still do not or are not comfortable with transacting online. So there might also be a cultural component to this: because it does not seem prevalent here, we might be less aware and vigilant about it. Nevertheless, here’s a useful article from the Philippine Daily Inquirer that enumerates the safeguards to adopt to protect private information and deter being victimized by virtual thieves.
Anyway, perhaps the best way to go about this is to remember:
- Personal information should always be communicated in private
- Social-networking sites are fun and though they are marketed as secure, it’s still up to us to protect ourselves and others
- Pause and breathe before acting – especially if you’ve been playing Mob Wars the whole day – bad for logical and rational thinking
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