Privacy Online & Offline

 

It is very important nowadays to keep your digital footprint clean, especially as college students looking for jobs and internships very soon. The first TED talk I watched was Juan Enriquez's Permanent Tattoo. The Electronic Tattoo talk was very intriguing to listen to because everyone is affected by it. With everything we post, it's immortalized in a database and it knows who you are and what you like which is scary. I like how Juan talked about Greek mythology and related all of them to us posting online. But the most intriguing one was the Andy Warhol quote about how everyone in the future, which is now, will only have 15 minutes of fame. Quite scary for a quote said back in 1966 because it's pretty much become a reality with apps like TikTok and Instagram and people get that short-lived fame when their post goes "viral".

The Next TED talk I watched was Christopher Soghoian's How to Avoid Surveillance. I already knew that the government listens into phone calls all the time, that's a no-brainer. But what I didn't know was that iMessage and WhatsApp have message encryption which the government isn't happy about and the government is trying to get rid of that so they can view our messages. I think that's bad because most of the population are normal, everyday people texting friends and family. Just because there are a few bad apples in the pile doesn't mean we should compromise everyone else. But having that knowledge of the fact that the government can't see my text gives me ease that they're not always listening to what I say and reading what I write.

I think that the government should not be nosing into everyone's business unless there's an actual threat to someone or something that'll happen. There should be a trigger for their system when someone is planning something instead of having thousands of employees listening in on phone calls each day keeping track. Just have a robot do that and find out who is sinister. Spying in on normal, everyday people just talking about what they did that day to whomever they're talking to is eerie to think about. I understand the importance of government surveillance but it's a bit too much for people.

We can protect ourselves from privacy invasions by, as I mentioned earlier, using iMessage, FaceTime, or WhatsApp to communicate with each other as the most secure communication method. We should also be careful of what we post online which could potentially damage our reputation and prevent us from future employment. In my strategic communication class, we recently talked about how it's difficult to build an image but it's easy to take down. What that means is that it takes years to make a good reputation for ourselves but it can all come crashing down very fast with posting bad things online. So, always be mindful of what you're posting online and stay safe.