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Social Media Truths: References and Further Reading

For Further Reading: articles and topics:

TikTok bans distract from wider privacy concerns, says digital rights advocate

Your Social Media Is (Probably) Being Watched Right Now, Says New Surveillance Report

Facebook accused of conducting mass surveillance through its apps

References:

Works Cited

Child, Jeffrey T., and Shawn C. Starcher. 2016. “Fuzzy Facebook Privacy Boundaries: Exploring Mediated Lurking, Vague-Booking, and Facebook Privacy Management.” Computers in Human Behavior 54: 483–90. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2015.08.035.

De Leyn, Tom, Ralf De Wolf, Mariek Vanden Abeele, and Lieven De Marez. 2022. “In-Between Child’s Play and Teenage Pop Culture: Tweens, TikTok & Privacy.” Journal of Youth Studies 25 (8): 1108–25. https://doi.org/10.1080/13676261.2021.1939286.

Lupton, Deborah, and Ben Williamson. 2017. “The Datafied Child: The Dataveillance of Children and Implications for Their Rights.” New Media & Society 19 (5): 780–94. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444816686328.

Marwick, Alice, Claire Fontaine, and danah boyd. 2017. “‘Nobody Sees It, Nobody Gets Mad’: Social Media, Privacy, and Personal Responsibility Among Low-SES Youth.” Social Media + Society 3 (2): 205630511771045–. https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305117710455.

Stoilova, Mariya, Sonia Livingstone, and Rishita Nandagiri. 2020. “Digital by Default: Children’s Capacity to Understand and Manage Online Data and Privacy.” Media and Communication (Lisboa) 8 (4): 197–207. https://doi.org/10.17645/mac.v8i4.3407.

When Online Gets Out of Line Privacy, Make an Informed Online Choice. 2006. Information and Privacy Commissioner/Ontario : Facebook.

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Social Media Truths: Series 3: Mental Health

Social media can be a wonderful tool, but it does have its impacts on mental health. Some concerns include:

Social Media: Identity and Social Pressures:

Social media can offer social support, but it leaves individuals open to criticism.[1] Content can focus on those who are white and middle class; which can add pressure to those to focus on upward mobility or to ‘fit in.’ [2]

Social Media and Content :

When using social media, it will contain sensitive content that deals with current issues that are pressing to POC and LGTBQ+ and other related communities.[3] Furter, members of these communities are at risk of bullying and harassment. [4]

How to Handle Issues With Mental Health:

Meditation:

Meditation can assist with anxiety issues and other mental health concerns.

Physical ‘Offline’ Activities:

Physical offline activities include any hobby that does not solely rely on social media or an internet connection. Physical offline activities will not only help with developing skills, but they will allow the brain a chance to ‘decompress’ and ‘unwind’ these can include, but are not limited to: exercise, yoga, nature hikes/walks, reading, writing, crafting.

Monitor Usage:

Pay attention to when and how much time you are spending on social media. Pay attention to how social media is affecting your mental health. Look for the signs on when you need to step away from social media and take a break. This can include feeling irritated, tired, and nervous/anxious.

Intentional Social Media Use:

Be intentional with the time spend on social media. Set limits on how long, and what, content you view. This includes monitoring your social media intake and what content you are engaging with.  Choosing when and what content you will engage with can assist with a more enjoyable use of social media.

Taking social media breaks

Give yourself time to spend offline; pay attention to how you are responding emotionally and mentally to social media. Social media can cause an information overload – and it is ok to need to take a break! This can be a break where you set times during the day you will not use social media, or certain days a week. A break can also include limiting, or cutting, social media use for a few days, weeks or months if needed.

Identifying Mental Health Symptoms and Using Social Media

If you are viewing content on social media discussing symptoms of mental illnesses and find you are relating to, or struggle with, similar symptoms

Do:

Begin tracking the symptoms and when they occur

Analyze the resource: who is posting this content? Why are they posting this content? What is the purpose of this content? Does this content come from an authorized source?

Consider: do symptoms overlap? When do these symptoms become noticeable?

Take these notes and concerns to a Licensed Professional. Please speak a professional if you believe you need help.

Do Not:

Rely on free online screenings.

Rely on free online resources

Take free online content as authorized health information, unless it comes from a governmentally run public health resource.

It is ok to need help! Again: Please reach out to a medical professional if you believe you are in need of help.

Links to:

Introduction

Series 1

Series 2

References and Further Reading

Reference Notes:

[1] Marwick, Alice, Claire Fontaine, and danah boyd. 2017. “‘Nobody Sees It, Nobody Gets Mad’: Social Media, Privacy, and Personal Responsibility Among Low-SES Youth.” Social Media + Society 3 (2): 205630511771045–. https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305117710455.

[2] ibid

[3] ibid

[4] ibid

[understanding-social-media]

Social Media Truths: Series 2: How To Protect Yourself Online

Concerns and important notes:

Being careful: one does not need to completely cut social media and the internet form their daily life; if one chooses to engage with social media it will be important to practice safe internet use.[1] This can be done by making informed decisions, which will be discussed below. [2]

False sense of  ‘nothing to hide’: this is a common misconception. It is a widely spread belief that ‘if you have nothing to hide, you do not need to worry about police or government surveillance.’[3] However this suggest that only those who are against mass data collection are ‘at fault.’[4] But this is not the case, because mass data collection will effect even the innocent ; it is a matter or privacy protection and rights for all. [5]

Everyday surveillance: online surveillance can be as invasive as physical surveillance. While online surveillance is less present, it is a part of every day life. [6]

So how does one protect themselves online?

Make informed decisions:

When you sign up for a website make sure it is done with as much information as you can gather. Take the time to study the privacy protection and rights you have provided from the website.[7]

Make informed decisions about the websites you choose to register with, and applications you download onto your phone.[8] Further still, it is important to make informed decisions on the information you choose to share, and who the audience you choose to share it with is.[9]

Making an informed decision:

Studying a website or platform:

Does the website allow you to join from a private network? [10]

Can you block access to certain private information and data collection?[11]

If the website has profile creation: can you make a private profile that is only viewable with your consent? [12]

Is the following information publicly listed without any means making it private: your contact information, home and work address, profile?[13]

Is your online activity logged and made public to other users?[14]

Thinking before posting:

Before creating a post and sharing consider:

Are the pictures or images on your profile appropriate?[15]

Are you comfortable with strangers seeing, or coming across, information on this profile that is publicly available? [16]

Safe media consumption:

Use popup and advertisement blockers.

Use cookie cleaners.

Clean application and internet cache

Install tracking and data collection blockers.

Reflect on what you consider private information: make sure you, and those around you, do not post information online that you do not want public. Reciprocate this respect to family and peers.

Post intentionally: use anonymous accounts, create professional use accounts.

While making sure to take you are using the internet safely, it is also important to monitor your mental health while using social media and the internet. The next post in the series will discuss steps on how you can take care of, and monitor, your mental health.

Link To:

Introduction:

Series 1

Series 3

References and Further Reading

Reference Notes:

[1] When Online Gets Out of Line Privacy, Make an Informed Online Choice. 2006. Information and Privacy Commissioner/Ontario : Facebook.

[2] ibid

[3] ibid

[4] ibid

[5] ibid

[6] ibid

[7] ibid

[8] ibid

[9] ibid

[10]When Online Gets Out of Line Privacy, Make an Informed Online Choice. 2006. Information and Privacy Commissioner/Ontario : Facebook.

[11] ibid

[12] ibid

[13] ibid

[14] ibid

[15] ibid

[16] ibid

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Social Media Truths: Series 1: Understanding Data and Online Privacy

It is important to understand what data is and how it functions. Data represents information that makes up an individual, so data refers to the digital, or computer based, information regarding a specific person or sometimes a group or organization.

Data works in 3 functions:

Private data: this is also known as interpersonal data. This is private data that deals with your personal information and relationships.[1]

Institutional data: this is data collected by organizations and corporations. This would contain educational or medical records.[2]

Commercialized data: this is data that is collected and stored through generated online profiles. These are created for marketing and sales purposes only. Such data will be found on sites like Facebook and Instagram. [3]

What stays private online?

 What is posted and shared online does not remain private.

Social media will monitor, or act as a surveillance tool for data. This is done through:

Likes

Hash tag grouping

Comments

Messaging

Online posts

Pages and posts viewed

Surveillance

Surveillance is the monitoring of behaviors and activity. This can occur offline and online. Offline surveillance can occur socially via crowds, family and peers. Online surveillance deals with usage of a website or application.  [4]

Schools, organizations, corporations, family and friends can all track and surveil online activity that is made public.[5] Organizations and corporations will have access to data even if it is not made public. [6]

An example: a look at hash tags:

#FitnessGram which can be used as a self-tracker but also used by fitness groups to monitor their members progress and activity.[7] It can also be used by educational institutions and organizations as a means to motivate students towards physical activities outside the classroom or organization.[8]

Privacy, Surveillance and Social Media: How is it used?

TikTok monitors ‘liked’ and ‘viewed’ videos to create a ‘For You Page.’[9] It generates data based off the content, hashtags and use engagement to pull related content for the viewer. [10]This means videos viewed, commented on, or liked will not kept ‘hidden’ from the TikTok organization. It is a surveillance tool to track user behavior and engagement.

Facebook is able to use location based tracking of its users through mobile applications.[11] Facebook also recently admitted it was able to use data from text-messages for verification and marketing purposes. [12]

What does it mean?

An understanding of how to protect your privacy is crucial to navigating social media use.

How to Protect Yourself Online will discuss steps on safety measures and tools that can be used.

Link to:

Introduction

Series 2

Series 3

References and Further Reading

Reference Notes:

[1] Stoilova, Mariya, Sonia Livingstone, and Rishita Nandagiri. 2020. “Digital by Default: Children’s Capacity to Understand and Manage Online Data and Privacy.” Media and Communication (Lisboa) 8 (4): 197–207. https://doi.org/10.17645/mac.v8i4.3407.

[2] Ibid

[3] ibid

[4] Lupton, Deborah, and Ben Williamson. 2017. “The Datafied Child: The Dataveillance of Children and Implications for Their Rights.” New Media & Society 19 (5): 780–94. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444816686328.

[5]Ibid

[6] Ibid

[7] Ibid

[8] Ibid

[9] De Leyn, Tom, Ralf De Wolf, Mariek Vanden Abeele, and Lieven De Marez. 2022. “In-Between Child’s Play and Teenage Pop Culture: Tweens, TikTok & Privacy.” Journal of Youth Studies 25 (8): 1108–25. https://doi.org/10.1080/13676261.2021.1939286.

[10] ibid

[11] Child, Jeffrey T., and Shawn C. Starcher. 2016. “Fuzzy Facebook Privacy Boundaries: Exploring Mediated Lurking, Vague-Booking, and Facebook Privacy Management.” Computers in Human Behavior 54: 483–90. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2015.08.035.

[12] Ibid

[understanding-social-media]

Social Media Truths

Social Media Truths

Why am I calling out social media? Well….

Social media is an incredibly resource and tool. It is a space of expression, networking and community building. But what happens to your content when you post it? What is going on behind the scenes when you scroll through Twitter, Instagram and TikTok?

Understanding privacy can feel like a daunting task, so this series of blog posts will seek to  break down privacy issues, go through your privacy rights, and conclude with two final posts on how you can protect yourself online and how monitor and take of your mental health while using social media.

They will be broken into the following posts:

Series 1: Understanding Data and Online Privacy

Series 2: How To Protect Yourself Online

Series 3: Mental Health: Safe Social Media Practices