A Study of The Role of Social Media Concerning Confidentiality of Personal Data

Social networking has become a trend in modern day. Platforms like Facebook are on high demand by people across the world. These platforms provide free communication among people hence; they have gained a lot of popularity amongst the global population. Social media conducts the noble role of connecting a significant number of families and friends while at the same time it promoted retrogressive trends. There are several advantages as there are disadvantages affiliated to social media. However, this paper will be evaluating the ethical justification of whether or not social media should share a user’s information to other companies for whatsoever reason.

I believe that personal data should be secured at all cost and social networking platforms should not share user information with other companies. If this is to happen, the social networking platform should have consent from the individual rather than sharing ignorantly without informing the user (Zelkowitz, 2015). Such malpractice could lead to serious implications such as fraud and therefore sharing of user information in my opinion in unethical.

Social media has both its positive and negative side. On the positives, social media helps one to link with family, friends and strangers hence promoting social integration and cohesion. However, the negative effects of social media on personal life seem to hold more weight. Social media platforms encourage people to publicize their lives (Bryfonski, 2016). This could be traumatizing for individuals who do not get much attention from people on social media. On the other hand, these platforms provide an individual with a false connection. This results in wasting a lot of time on social media and giving little attention to the important aspects of life.

Social media is also to blame for decreased productivity among a significant population of youths and employees (Bryfonski, 2016). While these platforms may be helpful in passing important information and communicating with stakeholders, there are many distractive elements that cause individuals to forget about work. This results to overall unproductive individuals. Social media can be helpful and distractive at the same time depending on how an individual uses it.