Home » Bytetins » Bytetin Five: Habit – Social Media: share with caution

Bytetin Five: Habit – Social Media: share with caution

October 6th, 2021 Posted in

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Social media apps such as Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat are great ways to connect with friends and family. However, you need to remember that, if you use any app for free, you’re the product – not the customer.

You see, the data that you share with these apps – such as where you use the app, who you connect with, what you search and so on – is carefully harvested and sold to third parties, so you can be targeted with relevant advertising.

Moreover, social media is a great way for cyber criminals to harvest information about you. Of course, this doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t use social media. It’s just that we all need to be cautious about what we share and with whom we share it.

Imagine, if a total stranger were to search for your name and come across your social media profiles, what would they find? To this end, we recommend you check your privacy settings.

We also advise never to use Facebook or Google for signing-in to other apps because, if either of those account details are breached, a hacker could then access multiple accounts. Instead, we strongly recommend using a password manager – of which more details tomorrow – to create unique passwords for each of your online accounts.

Useful advice on improving your privacy on Facebook can be found here:

https://www.allthingssecured.com/tutorials/facebook-privacy-settings/#:~:text=Change%20Facebook%20Privacy%20Settings.%201%201.%20Limit%20Past,Recognition.%205%205.%20Control%20Off-Facebook%20Activity.%20More%20items

You may have noticed WhatsApp is now owned by Facebook. Whilst the encryption protocols mean they can’t read what’s in your messages, they can monitor which contacts you communicate with and how often. You could change to a secure, privacy focused messaging app such as Signal or Telegram.