In the seminar we had a productive discussion about the power that institutions hold when it comes to our personal information. It was proposed that personal information (for example information contained in Facebook profiles) is used by various institutions in order to be used for targeted marketing. Jordan mentioned that he had no issues with our data being used to this end. He also expressed his nonplus attitude about institutions possessing this information as it is not something that affects him. Eliza said that it is scary to think that our entire online behaviors could be monitored, exposing so much about ourselves through our uses of media. I had conducted some research into online security for an assignment in Pop Culture. I mentioned that Elahi (2009) has expressed concerns about how we have little control let alone access to our own personal information once it is put online, Elahi (2009) also states that our human rights are challenged when it comes to privacy and consent, despite our increased power do to new media.
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Elahi, S 2009, ‘Privacy and consent in the digital era’, Information Security Technical Report, Vol. 14, No. 3, pp. 113-118.
