Privacy is in vogue. I believe Mark Zuckerberg's so called "Law of Information Sharing" is dead. While we as a society may continue to share more information online via social media, the cloud, apps, email, etc... people are more aware of the dangers of sharing too much so they are changing their behavior accordingly.
Facebook recently admitting that younger teens are using their platform less. Why? The answer is debatable; however, I believe it has something to do with parents, employers, schools, the police, governments, etc... wanting access to their personal digital content. To help users believe the content they send online is safe from prying eyes multiple apps and other digital services have popped up that claim that user privacy is built in by design. One of the most popular apps that claim they are built with privacy in mind is Snapchat.
Snapchat has become so popular that it was recently reported that Facebook tried to acquire the company for $3 billion dollars and Google may have offered $4 billion dollars. There are allegedly 400 million snaps (images sent via Snapchat) received daily on the platform apparently because users believe their content is safer sent via Snapchat than through other services.
While Snapchat offers some better privacy protections than other content sharing apps due to its allegedly disappearing photo offering, its latest iOS update Replay feature actually endangers user privacy by allowing an image to be re-viewed at a later time. In general, when opening a snap you don't have another image capturing device handy to take an image of the snap being viewed. Usually, one opens a snap and it disappears after several seconds. No harm, no foul unless the receiver has another image capturing device handy. With the new Replay option enabled, if someone sends a nude selfie or other potentially scandalous image, the receiver now may have plenty of time to have another device ready to capture the image.
Before this iOS update, images sent via Snapchat could be re-purposed beyond their intended usage and there have been some publicized incidents of snaps creating problems for those in the image(s). For example, a Missouri mom is in legal trouble and was recently charged with endangering the welfare of a child (one of her kids) due to a topless photo her daughter took of her that was sent via Snapchat. This case demonstrates the potential dangers users may encounter when taking personal photographs/videos and disseminating the images via digital platforms; even through Snapchat.
Providing a "second bite at the apple" to view content that a user has deemed "Snapable" or more private than images shared via Facebook is a danger to privacy. Once content is digitized, it can potentially be sent anywhere in the world and saved for an infinite period of time. Allowing more opportunities to view potentially scandalous content may put users' privacy at risk.
Copyright 2013 by the Law Office of Bradley S. Shear, LLC All rights reserved.
No comments:
Post a Comment