Social Media Facts, Myths, and Threats

 According to (Vaidhyanathan, 2018), there consists of three major forms of surveillance:

1. Commercial and political entity exploitation through advertisements: Based on what we reveal on our FB profiles, different companies are able to track our behaviors and purchases through search engines and recommend us products listed through ads on the side of screens. Additionally, governments and political figures could also dissect our Facebook profiles to assess the demographics and psychographics of each citizen, so they are able to promote candidate compaigns strategically
2. FB tracking profiles/ Social Graph: FB tracks different biographical data, chats with friends and family members, saves locations, photos, videos, posts and has complete control over user content. All of user interests and behaviors are utilized by FB to predict popular segments, points of interest, etc.. and base it off other people’s similar interests and behaviors.
3. Open Graph: gathering different services such as WhatsApp, messenger and Instagram to all connect to one single service (Open Graph) which stores all information regarding habits, music preferences, interactions.. Therefore even if people hardly log into FB anymore, this device collects all the information from social media platform you are active through cookies and allows for user personal insight and data collection.

Odeh says the online communication of Palestinian women and girls is impacted by patriarchy and the Israeli occupation through a “surveillance tower.” This exposes how violence is a large factor that influences Palestinian women digitally and visually. Patriarchy rules over on virtual platforms as well where they are able to harass women verbally. Some still maintain a submissive position as they are in constant fear, as well as having limited freedom of expression and creative expression to post anything they desire. Additionally, “surveillance tower”is the “familial and social surveillance that monitors [and intervene in] their moves online, resulting in increased pressure to censor themselves” (Odeh, 2018). This social surveillance monitor reveals the amount of sexual and violent harassment present within Palestinian women (results revealed over 60%)

References

Odeh, S. (2018, November 1). A violent network: Gender-based violence against Palestinian women in virtual space. Retrieved from https://www.apc.org/en/pubs/violent-network-gender-based-violence-against-palestinian-women-virtual-space

Vaidhyanathan, S. (n.d.). Anti Social Media: How Facebook Disconnects Us and Undermines Democracy. Retrieved from https://archive.indianculturalforum.in/2018/08/18/anti-social-media-how-facebook-disconnects-us-and-undermines-democracy/