Several facts we tend to ignore and disregard about social media are the very same reasons we lie not just with other people but to ourselves as well.
With its fame on the peak, social media sites Facebook, Twitter and Instagram changed the conventional exchange of personal hellos and the supposed to be private talks, secret shares, and nonsense posts became publicized.
It is sad, though, how everyone actively participates in this modern day plague of society and even more depressing how we could not resist its offer of self-gratification. Lies sprout from this kind of communication and even as we filter what we express, we only depict a fantasy edition of ourselves and wrong impressions from others denying them of knowing who we really are.
Friend but not a Friend
Almost everyone on Facebook got hundreds and thousands of friends, likes and maybe even romantic affairs. Same thing with followers you have on Twitter and Instagram, a significant fraction of them were people you never really met in person. People build a connection with a weak foundation and it is a fact that personal relationships with others are compromised with the shallow intimacy and involvement created.
Lots of connections and a wide range of links to other people through social media form bridges out of ropes forming uncertain networks of relation with people, mostly strangers. “Friends” you have on Facebook and other social website accounts do not really mean friends with the right definition. Thousands of friends on FB and IG, but really, how many from those friends’ list do you really know personally? How many of those social media friends can you really count on as a friend?
Lie To Me
With all those posts daily you see on social media, depicting much of a fantasy and a really great life a person shows in his selfie and food porn pictures, you just might want to wonder what’s really behind those wonderful and great stories publicized on the internet. How the world have really changed. Privacy was no more and exposed shared lives are just a click and search away.
A 5-year Australian study by The Works, a Sydney Advertising Agency, published conclusions on lies born out of social networking sites. It was found out that women lie most in social media. They discovered that the top lie usually told for both male and females is “Nothing’s wrong, I’m Fine”. The difference of lie for men meant to look good themselves and lies for women meant to make others feel good.
“On social media, people inhabit a slightly different personality where everything in their world seems to be great – their friends are great and the food they eat is great – and we felt we needed to investigate this,” a statement from Douglas Nicol, The Works creative partner, and Head of Datafication project.
Sincerely Yours, Hackers
It’s already become a trend where even location and certain other clues are posted on one’s social media account. Security threats do exist and it is just a hacker’s daily bread. With the personal information you use and post on Facebook and Twitter, you invite our buddy hackers for fraud and spamming. As the first and major step in hacking, personal information gathering is a must.
A study called “Getting in Bed with Robin Sage” conducted by Thomas Ryan, a security specialist, was proved fruitful as to the danger and seriousness of hacking social networking sites. Robin Sage, the key identity, and element of the research played the role of a hacker, started the task with faking profile accounts in Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn with a photo of a good-looking woman and completed information on educational background. In a 28-day duration of contacting people online, he was able to obtain email addresses, conference invitations, bank account numbers and a job at the same time.
A news report had also claimed Facebook to have as much as 83 million fake accounts which clearly indicates that several people may have different motives. People who carelessly post location, photos or even a simple yet informative lines on their social media accounts for the world to see invites uninvited attention from ill-intent individuals who may advance into criminal acts.
In the present era of technological advancement and personal communication is deteriorating, confusion of what is true and what is not adds to the list of the sad parts of modernization. How would people be able to fix something they started themselves?