Social Media: Information Technology

Abstract
Social Media websites such as Facebook, Twitter, are universally known and present in parts of the world in today’s society. Social media have become such a part of many people daily activities that most couldn’t image living without it. It has brought many benefits to us, but also some pitfalls. Facebook monitors how third parties use your personal data, however, they also state they cannot guarantee “that third parties will follow Facebook’s privacy policy, if you don’t want your privacy violated, then you probably want to reconsider joining Facebook or other social networks. The definition of “privacy” is subjective, however, things like personal information such as name, living and working locations, job, career, education, income, relationship status, contact information, and bank information should be safeguarded at all costs to prevent things like stalking, identity theft, fraud, and other attempts to undermine a person’s life. It’s not all bad, Facebook has reunited family’s, long lost friends, and is helping police officers catch the bad guys, however, like anything, too much can be bad for you. More recently social media has been known as the tool that facilitated many uprising in Middle Eastern countries. It helped kick start a revolution known as the Arab Spring. Facebook was used to schedule activities such as gatherings to protest, Twitter was used to coordinate an array of events at a moment’s notice, and Youtube was used to voice this struggle to the world. Social Media has played a major part in overthrowing governments in countries like Egypt, Libya, and Syria. Once depressed people in these countries relied on state sponsored media for their info but with the rise of social media this is no longer the case. In my paper I will examine the facts on how social media is used and for what