That was, in fact, one of the points in the article. It’s true, some people see the privacy issue but ultimately seem to decide to ignore it. Others seem not to see the issues at all or see them and still believe that nothing bad will ever happen to them. Dennis might still be right however. Those people that are not aware or believe they’re immune will very likely change their opinion once they become victims. With social networking become more popular more people will likely be targeted so there might be a critical mass at some point as when enough people get bitten peer pressure will force change.

Its obviously just speculation but quite possible I believe.

It’s funny how both of you mention some sort of social backlash due to the lack social networking security. But isn’t Facebook and Chatroulette already feeling the brunt of this backlash? A good number of users have been very vocal about the lack of privacy, but it’s not like this “backlash” has done any sort of damage to the user base. These users still haven’t stopped using these sites, neither have they started migrating to try any others. It seems like the world is addicted to social networking, whether it’s healthy for them or not.

I predict a sort of social backlash (of more than the vocal variety) in the next decade or so. With the internet cracking user profiles open like a nutcracker in Christmas, it’s only a matter of time until the world implodes under the sheer weight of its own lack of security. How that backlash will go, I can’t really say. But I’m predicting it will literally change how we interact, and socially network online.

In principle I agree with you, everyone should be free to do what they want. If someone wants to advertise their social security number online it’s their choice. However like you correctly said some people do not realize what the repercussions of their actions will be and that’s the core problem. The big question then is how should you act towards these people? Ideally you would educate them but that’s not always possible. You could also ignore the problem and leave everyone free to act as they wish but it’s not really that simple either. What happens if such a person writes about things which are damaging to his/her employer? What if they write about security issues that put their company at risk? What if they write things which make their company liable?

I agree everyone should be free to act in any way they wish, this also means that businesses can also act in any way they wish, the problem is striking a balance between the two. It’s not easy and there is no clear answer unfortunately.

@ Bruce

It’s not just Facebook really, targeted marketing is a big thing. A lot of businesses try to do it. Some use the terms you search for to decide what Ads to show you, others try to guess what you like by using the contents of the page you visit (that is displaying the Ad) and some go even further than that and try to track every page you visit by installing adware/spyware on your machine.

Yes, they KNOW what you are doing online.

But the worse thing is, there are those who purposely invade other people’s privacy without their permission and consent. I think it’s about time that something serious should be done about that.

It would have been nice if companies inform when they discover credit cards have been compromised. I do wonder however how many people would actually pro actively cancel their credit cards if they’re informed these might have been compromised!

That’s terrible about your credit card. I’m guessing either whatever company had their data breeched didn’t realize it or it fell into the hands of a rogue employee at one of them. I was caught up in the Heartland data breech. I got a letter from my bank telling me they had been informed that their customer’s cards had been affected so they were canceling them and replacing them with new ones. I was fortunate that no fraudulent transactions had occurred!