Social Media and Other People's Privacy

This research focuses on the security and privacy issues faced by users on social media platforms. It explores the violation of privacy in social networking sites and the risks of social engineering. The research aims to identify the reasons behind privacy and security breaches and provide remedies and recommendations to protect personal information. The study is conducted at a social level to understand users' views on their use of social media.

Running head: SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
Social Media and other people’s privacy
Name of the Student
Name of the University

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Table of Contents
Chapter 1: Introduction....................................................................................................................3
1.1 Background.......................................................................................................................3
1.2 Problem statement.............................................................................................................4
1.3 Aim, Objectives and Research Questions.........................................................................5
1.4 Research Structure............................................................................................................6
Chapter 2: Literature Review...........................................................................................................7
2.1 Concept of Social Media.......................................................................................................7
2.2 Different forms of social media.............................................................................................7
2.3 Violation of Privacy in Social Networking Sites...................................................................9
Twitter........................................................................................................................................14
Whatsapp...................................................................................................................................14
Snapchat.....................................................................................................................................15
Skype.........................................................................................................................................15
Spamming......................................................................................................................................16
2.4 Social Engineering Risks.....................................................................................................18
Account risks.................................................................................................................................21
Content Threats:.............................................................................................................................22
2.5 Remedies..............................................................................................................................24
Chapter 3: Research Methodology................................................................................................25

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3.1 Research Philosophy............................................................................................................25
3.2 Research Approach..............................................................................................................26
3.3 Research Design..................................................................................................................27
3.4 Data Collection technique....................................................................................................28
3.5 Sampling Method and Size..................................................................................................28
3.6 Data Analysis Method.........................................................................................................29
3.7 Ethical Consideration...........................................................................................................30
Chapter 4: Data Findings and Analysis.........................................................................................31
4.1 Quantitative Data Analysis..................................................................................................31
Chapter 5: Conclusion and Recommendations..............................................................................41
5.1 Conclusion...........................................................................................................................41
5.2 Recommendations................................................................................................................43
5.3 Future work..........................................................................................................................43
References......................................................................................................................................44

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Chapter 1: Introduction
1.1 Background
Social media is a proper collection of different channels of online communication that have
been dedicated for taking inputs from community for collaborating and sharing contents. These
websites have been dedicated with social networking forums, social networking, micro blogging
and other social media types (Perrin 2015). Social media has become a part of the human life.
Most of the youngsters have been active on various social media platforms. They used to share
their personal details over different social media platforms including Facebook, Twitter, Snap
chat, Instagram and WhatsApp. Therefore, security and privacy of data has become a serious
issue over these social media platforms. There have been various cases reported related to breach
of privacy and security of data and information of users over social media.

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Figure 1: Level of concern about online privacy in the United Kingdom
(Source: Fuchs 2017)
Social media has been becoming an integral part of users in the real world. Most of the users
have been active on social media websites every day. Users have been positing their daily life
activities over the social media. Social media has brought various revolutionary changes in all
over the world (Tuten and Solomon 2017). The driving factors for the adoption of social media
have been progressively accessing proper functionality and flexibility of social technologies.
However, there have been various limitations and challenges faced over social media.
Users have been facing security and private issues over social media. There have been various
cases reported over the social media related to privacy and security of personal data of users.
This has been becoming a new threat over social media. Both males and females have been
facing cyber bullying issues over social media.
1.2 Problem statement
The major problem discussed in this research has been the security and privacy issues faced
by users over social media. The internet has been expanding its growth over various industries
and users. Most of the users have been activities over the social media and sharing their personal
and daily activities over the social media platforms. This has become an issue regarding safety
and security of their personal data uploaded over social media platforms (Yin et al. 2015). Many
researches have reported that their e have been increase in the cyber threats over social media.
Various social media platforms have been facing data breach issues. Many users have been
complaining about loss of their personal data and internet over the internet. The major problem
faced by users have been leak and misuse of their personal information on other illegal work.

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The use of social media has been increasing on a daily basis. Therefore, the cyber security risk
has been increasing over social media platforms. Social media provide platform for sharing
personal information with others (Zhang and Gupta 2018). There has been lack of awareness
among users regarding sharing their personal information over social media. Therefore, this
create a huge threat for loss and misuse of personal information over the internet.
This research will be done identify the reasons behind privacy and security breach of data
and information users over social media. The aim of the research will be focusing in what degree
do social media users are caring about their privacy issues during sharing their personal
information over social media platforms. Therefore, there have been violation of various ethical
forms over the social media. This research has been focused on identifying the issues faced by
people over social media. This research has been done at social level for understanding their
views about their use over social media.
1.3 Aim, Objectives and Research Questions
The aim of this research has been focused on social media privacy issues faced by users over
social media.
Following are the research objectives:
 To identify whether social media networks protect the personal information of their users
in the same fashion or are there any differences
 To investigate who collects information about users apart from social media and spread
between parties
 To investigate how much social media users know about how much information is shared
with other parties

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Following are the research questions:
 Do social media networks protect the personal information of their users in the same
fashion or are there any differences?
 Other than the social media network itself, who else collects information about its users
and how is the information spread between parties?
 What do social media users know in the terms of how and how much information is being
spread? Do they care?
1.4 Research Structure
Figure 2: Research Structure
(Source: Created by author)
Chapter 1: Introduction
Chapter 2: Literature Review
Chapter 3: Research Methodology
Chapter 4: Data findings and analysis
Chapter 5: Conclusion and Recommendations

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Chapter 2: Literature Review
2.1 Concept of Social Media
Social Media refers to the form of media, which involves interactive participation. The
development of media can be divided into two different ages namely the broadcast age and the
interactive age. Broadcast age witnessed transferring of messages via television and radio and the
way of transferring messages was impersonal and time-consuming (Benson, Saridakis and
Tennakoon 2015). With the advancements in technology, interactive media came into force and
it became easier for individuals to interact in a more personal way. Social media enables
individuals to interact with many at a time and instant feedback can be obtained. The ease of
accessibility of social media has made it popular and it is the core of the ongoing revolution.
Social media involves some kind of digital platform that may be stationary or mobile. The two
main characteristics of social media are that it allows some sort of participation and it is
interactive in nature.
2.2 Different forms of social media
Some popular forms of social media in use are:
Email- The most common form of social media that is used in everyday life is electronic mail or
email. It is a form of exchanging messages between people using electronic devices. Email was
invented by Ray Tomlinson in the year 1960 (Wu, Shin and Luke 2017). It operates across the
network of computers that is termed as the internet. Previously it was mandatory for the sender
and the recipient to be online in order to send messages but at present, the emails use store and
forward model. Email acts as a reliable media to send documents, pictures and important files.
Examples of email are Gmail and Yahoo mail.

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Texters- Texting refers to the process of composing and sending e-messages, which
consist of alphanumeric characters in between users of laptops or desktops. The term originally
referred to messages being sent using SMS that is Short Message Service. Since then it has
grown widely to include multimedia images other than the alphanumeric texts. According to a
survey in 2017, it was seen that text messages are not only used by youth but also by adults for
social and personal purposes (Areni 2019). It has its applications in government and private
sectors as well where it is used as a medium to communicate between colleagues and authorities.
Text messages are used as an interaction medium with automated systems for example in case of
ordering products from e-commerce websites. Advertisers and service providers send messages
to mobile phone users about payment due dates and various promotion schemes using direct text
marketing.
Blogs- The word blog has been derived from the word weblog. It is a webpage that can be
accessed by an individual or a group to share information with a large group of people via
internet. Blogs are of many types according to the type of content shared and the way in which
the content is written. Information in a blog is displayed in reverse chronophilosophyal order so
that the recent ones come first (Kumar, Saravanakumar and Deepa 2016). Many blogs provide
comment section for particular subject and topic. Blogging can be used as a marketing strategy
as it helps in increasing online exposure thereby enabling small-scale businesses to become
leading industries.
Social Networking Sites- The social networking sites are a medium to reconnect with old
friends and acts as a bridge between the users staying at faraway places. Some popular sites are
Snapchat, Facebook and Whatsapp. Facebook is the widely used social networking site. It is an
American company that is headquartered in Menlo Park, California. Founded by Mark

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Zuckerberg and his college friends it was the first networking site to achieve one billion accounts
(Subramaniyaswamy et al. 2017). Facebook helps to find and connect with friends, keeps
individuals updated with recent news related to the pages liked in the person’s profile and to
create a common page or group to voice on common concerns. LinkedIn is one of the
professional social networking sites and is available in more than 20 languages. It is a platform
that connects different businesses and helps them find and hire eligible candidates.
2.3 Violation of Privacy in Social Networking Sites
Some people are of the opinion that online privacy is their private matter as it is up to
them whether to share informations online but it is a wrong conception as an individual cannot
fully control this. For example, pictures shared on social networking sites by friends and if a
person is tagged then an individual’s information is leaking out though without he himself
directly uploading any such content. The results of a study by a dysfunctional social media site
showed that the population of this digital era might need to reconsider ways to control their
private information being published on social media and the limits of their privacy (Wang,
Pauleen and Zhang 2016). When individuals join social networking sites, in order to connect
with their friends there are many apps, which import the contacts from the contact list and this
gets available to the social networking sites. Social media collects and curates informations and
makes use of these informations and creates shadow profiles. In 2013, shadow profiles were first
detected with a Facebook bug, which shared the phone numbers, and the e-mail addresses of
approximately 6 million users with their friends without their prior consent (Wamba and Akter
2016). Though the bug was immediately addressed by Facebook, still some of its users had their
phone numbers updated on the site and available publicly. Facebook had collected the phone
numbers from the contact list of its users and used the informations to note the contacts of their

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friends and it was fed in their account. It is more shocking to those who are not even in the social
networking platforms but still get their informations shared via their friend’s contact list. Thus, it
can be inferred that an individual is not in full control of his privacy as if his friends are in social
media he indirectly becomes a part of this. Informations from a friends profile can easily leak out
an individual’s private information such as his marital status, location, sexual orientation or
political affiliation (Wukich 2015). The issues related to the privacy of persons on online
platforms are growing at a faster rate. The smart phones are a revolutionary invention and have
enabled users to share anything at a click’s go. With the increasing use of smartphones, it has
become easy to share any content online and with every passing day the amount of informations
available online is increasing at an alarming rate. The context of some posts arouses privacy
issues as they reveal much about the physical and social information of the subject (Aldawood
and Skinner 2019). Privacy concerns are deep-rooted in the case of multimedia collections, as
they have the potential to reveal much of user’s personal data. Sharing of videos and pictures
pose a great threat to the teenagers succumbing to their vulnerability.

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Figure 2: The rise of Facebook
(Source: Zhang 2018)
There has been several hacks in privacy issues of Facebook users. Considering the case in
August 2007, the code used by users to access the home page of Facebook had been made
public. Beacon, a system launched by Facebook was in trouble when it was spying on the users
actions on other sites and feeding it to the giant site.(Soomro, Shah and Ahmed 2016). In June
2011, Facebook came up with automatic facial recognition feature named “Tag Suggestions”.
This feature makes a comparison between newly uploaded pictures and those of the user’s
friends and then suggests photo tags. European Union data-protection regulators were of the
opinion that if privacy rules are violated it would investigate the feature. Facebook speaking for
the feature said that if a user wants he could disable the feature. Location based social networks
are a part of Location based services. It refers to the link being made by GPS that is Global
Positioning System that tracks user’s location. They are referred to as Geosocial Networking.
As reported in Microsoft Research “a LBSN does not only mean adding a location to an
existing social network so that people in the social structure can share location-embedded
information, but also consists of the new social structure made up of individuals connected by
the interdependency derived from their locations in the physical world as well as their location-
tagged media content, such as photos, video, and texts” (Hajli and Lin 2016). The connection
between users far exceeds sharing only physical locations as it also involves sharing common
interests and activities. These pervasive tools are a challenge to privacy. LBSN users publish
their information without thinking of the privacy issues related such as anyone will be able to
track their whereabouts and could easily stalk them. The Russian-built app named Girls Around
Me aroused privacy concerns as it was using Foursquare’s API to find out people based on their

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geographical position and gender (Tayouri 2015). It compiled a list and then used the
information to search for those girls that had the link between both these accounts and then their
information was passed on to the users of the application. Yet another issue related to it is ‘opt-
in’ versus ‘opt-out’ default settings. An opt-in version deals with such default settings where a
certain platform requires its users to join a particular service in order to be benefitted from it.
After successful registration to the service, the provider is allowed to access the user’s data and
to offer the service. An opt out version includes all users as its beneficiaries but users have the
option to change the settings if they do not want the service. An example of opt-out scenario in
LBSN has been given by Facebook Messenger for Android and iPhone users. (Neaz et al. 2018).
If opting out is not used then might be for some users there will be a significant bridge of privacy
that the user had agreed with while downloading and using the app.Data Scrapping is one of the
main privacy issues relating to social networking sites. It refers to keeping a track of people’s
activities and collecting personal information from social media, job websites and online forums.
Research companies do data scrapping and they earn their revenue by selling these informations
to other companies. These companies use these personal data to develop targeted advertisement
campaigns for the products of their company Data harvesters do not ask for the consent of the
owner and this is an ethical issue and a privacy problem of online media. Nielson Co. a media-
research company was found to be indulged in data scraping in the year 2011 (Gavrilova et al.
2017). It was scraping messages of an online forum named PatientsLikeMe, where people talk of
their emotional problems.
Facebook applications are leaking data of the users and it has been reported many times
that identifying information are being leaked to advertisement and internet tracking companies.
While installing a app individuals are made to accept certain terms and conditions and once

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accepted the application gets a token which enables it to access data. Some Facebook
applications are leaking out these tokens to certain companies and they are getting access to the
private data such as chats and pictures. Disclaimer stating that individual’s data can be
transferred to third parties is never showed, thus putting the person’s online privacy and safety at
stake (Xu et al. 2016). Farm Ville and Family Tree are examples of applications, which are
leaking identifying information.
Online social tracking is another privacy violation tool prevalent now a days. It plays its
role when individuals click on buttons such as “Like” and “Tweet to share content with their
friends. These tracking tools make use of the cookies that are small sized files stored in a
computer. Users are tracked across different sites, thus individual’s interests are revealed, and
internet privacy ruined. Advertisement which pop up while working on a webpage are mere tools
of tracking as they gather information of what is being done on that page (Rani 2018). These
tracking tools are extensively being used in websites specially meant for teens and kids. One
such example of website tracking teen stuff is Snazzyspace.com.
The level of freedom offered by social networking is one of its major drawbacks. It gives
rise to discomfort and stirs as different people state their views and sometimes the debate arouses
violence. The man behind the recent attacks in Norway had used Twitter to keep his views in
front of the public before carrying out the attacks.
Twitter
Twitter is online social media platform where people interact through short messages
which are called tweet. Twitter was formed in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey, Noah Glass, Biz
Stone, and Evan Williams and was officially launched in July of that year. Twitter and tweeting
might be also called as micro blogging site. Initially twitter limit of characters is 140 .Now,

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Twitter has increased its character limits up to 280 (Reuter, Gellert and Geilen 2016).To use
twitter, users have to register to the portal. People in twitter interact with other by following
other or are followed by other. Unlike other social media platform , Twitter gives an unique
markup culture like RT that stands for re tweet, ’@’ and is followed by a identifier address of
the user, and ’#’ followed by a word represented by a hash tag .Twitter has many advantages
over other social media platform which makes twitter one of the most popular digital interacting
platform globally. It provides notification to the users which allows the users to view the post
they were tagged in. The hash- tags provided by twitter allow the user to check out all the topics
which is trending and acknowledge the users to different happenings in the world. It can be used
for personal interaction as well as business purpose. Twitter gives a global reach to the ideas and
stories of the users. Through twitter users can connect with global and local audiences.
Whatsapp
Whatsapp is a freeware messaging application on mobile platform which provides the
user free text and media message service with the help of internet data connection or Wi-Fi. It is
a cross platform application which allows different operating system users to access this
application. Whatsapp was created by Brian Action and Jan koum in ear 2009 (Rathore et al.
2017).Later Whatsapp was taken over by Facebook in 2014.Whatsapp working is user friendly
where users have to download the app and manage the setting according to their convenience and
have to send invitation to their friends for chat. Person can share videos, audio messages and text
messages through Whatsapp. It has many benefits like this application do not get auto download
on users phone (Chambers, Fry and McMasters 2018). It gives the users a platform to
communicate through emoticons and give the scope of double checking of messages. It do not
display advertisement on the home screen and imports the contact details automatically. Apart

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from that, user can share status and live location through this application. There is no limits to
numbers of messages to be sent.
Snapchat
Snap chat is video and photo sharing app .It is founded by Evan Spiegel ,bobby Murphy
and Reggie brown in the year 2011.There are some features which makes snap chat different
from other. All the photos and messages sent to other people is of short time span and get deleted
after time runs out (Ritter et al. 2015). It provides a special security feature which notifies the
users whether anyone had screenshot any messages or photos. User can control the views in their
snap stories and another important features of snap chat is that user can send money through
another snapcash.
Skype
Skype is a telecommunication software which provide world conversation in the form of
messages, video calls file sharing and instant messages. It was founded by Niklas Zennstrom
and Janus Friis in 2003 (Gan and Wang 2015).Skype provides many features like call in landline
and mobile, conference call, group instant messaging ,screen sharing ,sending files ,caller access
and provide caller ID, call transferring and call forwarding. It also provide voice mail conversion
to text.
Nowadays, many people use internet and visit social website to keep contact with their
respective friends, family and others where they share their thoughts, videos, photos and discuss
about their daily-lives (Zeng and Wei, 2013). All these social sites and media have had numerous
positive and negative effects. Social media allows to handle the user’s person al profiles and
allow them to post different files, media. In recent times the software developer is trying to

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implement advanced application for the development of social media. There are many who
misuse social media by accessing unauthorized programs, physical and network access, misusing
the passwords and bifurcating personal information between their official and personal
computers(Castillo, Mendoza and Poblete, 2013). With the increasing number of social media
there has been an increase in the hackers at an alarming rate. The information that are hacked by
the attacker are mainly used to send unauthorized messages, steal money from the victim’s
accounts and many more. Some of the social media attacks:
Spamming
The classic attack among all social media attack is the Spam attack like email spam,
game spam and messaging spam (Lin et al., 2013). Social networks add millions of users in their
user database every week, with respect to this type of popularity the spammers are taking
advantage to steal the information of the user. The common practice for spamming is the use of
compromised accounts by the help of phishing account details are added to the details of the
message, while the receiver does not even know about the compromised details and open the file
(Egele et al., 2013). Other type of spamming is the practise of commenting on people’s photos
and sending an invitation for a bogus event. The spammers place an advertisement where the
user write any normal information. For example, when the user sends an invitation for an event
on Facebook, the receiver achieves a notification on Facebook as well as on the email of the
receiver about the invitation details unless the receiver has explicitly paralysed the emails
notification. Many websites require CAPTCHA submission for further forwarding to their sites
but most of the CAPTCHA implementations are broken which help the attacker to carry his or
her attack smoothly (Korakakis, Magkos and Mylonas, 2014). If the daily message limit is
blocked the attacker can use multiple account by which they can forward the spam message very

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efficiently. Many social networks allow the user to report any message as a spam message but it
operates or works only when the attacker (the sender of the message) does not switch the user
account very frequently (Shen and Li, 2014).
Along with the spam of social networks, the reputation of such social networks is also
been misused which boost the details of all mail that are sent outside the social network. Some of
the links contain which tends to approach the user with a malicious attack by Trojan (Wueest,
2014).
Targeted Spam: The resource of information for a spammer is the social networks. Many
networks let programmed access along with scripts that can crawl whole network from email
address. Such type of scripts not only extract email address of the victim but also extract the full
details of the victim like name, hobbies and so on (Ahmed and Abulaish, 2013). All information
that are public can be retrieved from the social networks. Facebook suffered a bug in August
2010 which allowed anyone to view the real name and the profile picture of a user behind his or
her email address that ensure that anyone including the spammers can get this type of
information which consist of email addresses with corresponding full name and profile picture.
These problems are at behind making the targeted spam more feasible (Symantec, 2019).

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2.4 Social Engineering Risks
Placing baits in social media: There are various types of Search Engine Optimization
(SEO) attacks also the poisoning of SEO image is a trending issue in today’s world. Many social
network sites allow the user to view the most trending and hot at that moment (Ledford, 2015).
For example, Twitter, which list the trending posts or topics on the homepage. This is an
advantageous factor for an attacker who will easily get they access on the trending topics. The
attackers then search with keyword and then replaces the URL with the attacker’s link that takes
a user into a harmful site and resends the message. The normal visitors cannot differentiate
between the harmful and beneficial messages.
Scams Follower: The social media plays an important role in today’s society and
pressure the people to achieve more followers or friends, many websites are also there which
takes the details of account to give the number of followers of the user which again increases the
chance of spamming in a huge amount (Ferrara et al., 2016). This can allow spammers to hack
the account and misuse it by sending some irrelevant information to the connected group of that
account. A Turkish user accidentally produced an undocumented property in Twitter which force
other user to follow other users in May 2010. This discovery allows many users to follow other
user including the celebrities (Farwell, 2014).
Impersonation of Celebrities: There are many fake celebrities profile in the social
networks. Unfortunately, social media does not stop anyone in utilizing the name of any celebrity
and using the celebrity profile picture which are available in internet (Fire et al., 2014).
Authentication of virtual and real image should be there which will discriminate a virtual and
real profile picture. Sometimes this account gets promoted by millions of subscribers who
subscribe the account (Gritzalis et al., 2014). The subscription page includes an advertisement

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through which the attacker steal information of the user to misuse the information. Some other
services have been implemented verified accounts. Twitter confirmed the details of the user and
displays a message which says “verified account” on the profile of the user. The passwords set
by the user are often guessable by which the attacker enters into the victim’s profile to misuse
the profile. User should set a strong password. If the password is forgotten by the user every
social media allows password recovery process which helps to add password again for the
profile, but it is recommended to every user to set a strong password which is not easily
guessable and cannot give an access to another person (Madden, 2013).
Impersonation of friends: Impersonation is a big issue for all social networks. Password
of an account can be disclosed unintentionally by phishing attack and information stealing
softwares like Trojan. Once the attacker gains an access to a profile of a user, he or she can send
messages or update the profile of the user without the user’s convenience (Nilanet al., 2015). The
update of profile also comprises of external links which allow the user to direct entry in the
malicious site which can harm the user’s important account which contains all the details of the
user like name, password financial records, all policies of the organization and so on. This
intrinsic trust as well as the usual curiosity, results in the great click rate present in those harmful
links. Messages which come from a known profile can also contain malicious link but the user
should ensure that he or she should not visit such kinds of links which ask for subscription and
details of the user.
Koobface: One of the largest malware attacks was for W32.koobface worm. It is active
today and target the social media. It is one of the successful malware attacks as it utilizes the
wily social engineering tools. The attack is carried out by messaging an infected contents hand
forwarding by social media which helps the attack to achieve all relevant information of the user.

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Once installed, Trojan successfully downloads the components and start scanning for accessible
details to other social networks. The attacker asks the victim to crack a CAPTCHA which allow
the user to view the file and the attacker get all the accessible details of the user. The CAPTCHA
validation was not done by some reputed brand or software, it acts simply like a key for an
attacker which unlock the profile of the victim. Similar type of malware is the Albeit. J.S
Frienren is a harmful worm that attacks RenRen network and poplar highly in China (Yang et al.,
2014).
Phishing: The social networks ask for username and password for log in the user profile
so the best risk regarding the social media is the phishing attack. The update message of the
social media is displayed when a duplicate copy of the login page (which comprises of the log in
details) is used to steal the other details of the user (Chaudhry, Chaudhry and Rittenhouse, 2016).
The phishing is carried out mostly in organization sites where the attacker gains a lot but
phishing the particular organizational sites. Some social sites promote themselves by offering
some special official services offered by the social sites. “Twityviewer” was a rumor that was
spread on Twitter which allowed the someone to record the names of the people who are reading
his or her messages. This can only be don after subscribing to an external link where they need to
input the username and the password whenever a user signs in a social media, the user should
check that the site is official and is protected. Some phishing attacks cannot be notable and the
misuse of the account cannot be viewed by the respective user and can affect the user. For
example, Orkut phished suite which uses the Brazil carnival theme (Joe and Ramakrishnan,
2014).
Advanced fee Scams: It is also known as 419 scams. It is type of spamming where the
attacker deliberately visits the user and ask for the details, the user willingly discloses the details

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because of some profit. This type of spamming does not require any type of external links or
other sources. For example, a spammer visits a student and pretends himself as motivating agent
towards game environment and ask the student for his social media details, Student excitedly
delivers the attacker with the detail but the student does not have any idea what the agent can do
with the social media details that the student delivered to the spammer. With the help of the
details the spammer visits the student profile and changes the password and misuse the profile in
harmful way (Burns and Roberts, 2013).
Account risks
Resetting passwords:
When an account gets hacked the attacker immediately reset the password, so that the
valid user of the account cannot further access the account and the attacker can misuse the
account for his or her benefit. The password of the social media should be changed in a regular
manner. During the password recovery process the asked question is quite easy to answer like if
an user forgets his or her password and tries to reset the password the user has to answer some
easy question that can be easily predicted by the attacker, Such as “What is your name?0, “What
is your favourite fruit?”, “What is your date of birth?” and so on. People are advised to use the
user set question which will be difficult for an attacker to answer and the account can be safely
used (Cho and park, 2013).
BeFriend
Social media for an organization plays an important role for the organization but the
vulnerability of the organization increases as the attacker can now simply hack the data by
searching with the company name. The attacker sends a friend request to the social media then

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
he or she creates an equivalent account in the organizational site and can monitor all details of
the organization including market share, revenue, employee details, financial details, hospitality
details and so on (Zhang and Gupta 2018). Once the attacker builds up the trust with the
organization, he or she tries to achieve the sensitive data regarding the organization. For
example, a recent incident was happened in July 2010 where a fake profile namely Robin Sage
who sends request to the mutual friend and the other user also shows interest in the request as it
was displaying the mutual friend but they do not have any idea that who the person is actually
behind the profile. After some time, the profile acquires 100 of people connected to the same
fake profile (Ferrara et al., 2016).
Content Threats:
Infected profile Sites:
Social media is platform where the user can upload anything anytime. After few years of
the development of social media, some branded social sites stopped the user to upload some
malicious data in the network as it causes harm to the site. This helps the attacker to embed the
web-based attacking tools under the profile sites which generates a huge drive by download
attack. It is a staging place of a malware. For example, BASE64, a legitimate photo hidden by
malicious binary code. Malicious upload should be avoided by all social media to ensure the
brand quality in the market.
Malicious Links:
The user controls his or her profile, so they add some malicious content in the web pages.
The greatest attacks involve redirecting the profile user to an external harmful site which is
handled by the attacker. Attacks involves posting a malicious page on a registered dummy

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
profile. The redirecting page can also contain some advertisement which is composed of some
malicious composition which can be hacked by the attacker that can be misused by the attacker
(Singh, Bansal and Sofat, 2016).
Shortening URL:
Shortening of URL links is a great issue in today’s world. It is small domain name which
is combined by a malicious function key. This helps the attacker to create a short URL for a long
URL link. This is an advantageous attack for the attacker because it does not contain link break
and also fits well in short messages. There are many URL shortening services available publicly
(Cao and Caverlee, 2015).
Script Threats:
Manual Script attacks:
The simplest social media is the manual script attack. This is called “manual” because the
sufferer is said to copy and run the script in manual manner. One of the Facebook script attack is
the “find your Facebook twin”. Many people liked the idea and clicked the link of the page
which contain malicious worm (Kunwar and Sharma, 2016).
Cross-Site Scripting:
XSS (Cross-Site Scripting) is a type of injection attack. There are many methods for an
attacker to inject some infected custom scripts in a webpage which he does not even handle.
They user who visit the infected page the details of the user get forwarded to the attacker for
future misuse.
ClickJacking:

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
ClickJacking is an old attack which takes a new dimension in social media. The attack is
carried out by the attacker who ask the user to click on things which they are not aware of,
mainly a pre-loaded frame is there in behind the clicking area and. When the user clicks on the
malicious menu a new action is operated behind the invisible layer which includes extracting
information of the user to the attacker (Fire, Goldschmidt and Elovici, 2014).
2.5 Remedies
Usage of social media is quite common in recent world but being assured that all of the
data that the user had provided is secured is something not that easy. Data privacy is the biggest
form of threat while using a social media. Though every day the cyber team of different social
media sites are working day and night to defend the apps against malicious threats, but the users
have to be equally responsible while they are accessing the apps, specially while accessing from
their smart phones (Soomro, Shah and Ahmed 2016). Logging in to various apps or quizzes can
invite various malicious software into the operating system that can lead to the crash or, in most
cases, data theft may take place. Saving of login ids and passwords let the attackers to get into
the session id and access all the information they need. In addition to it, changing passwords
from time to time is another most effective way to stay out of the reach of the attackers.
Checking of the terms and conditions which are often skipped should be done in order to check
the permissions and the sharable content that the app contains within (Saridakis et al. 2016).

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
Chapter 3: Research Methodology
3.1 Research Philosophy
Research philosophy centers on a thought that manages the method for information
accumulation, investigation and utilized. Accordingly, investigate theory has been a wellspring
of data advancement as recognizable proof of procedures by which information can be related
with the research. It has been a basic piece of the research. Assessment of research reasoning has
been fundamental as it helps in choosing by which approach it has helped in responding to the
research questions (Taylor, Bogdan and DeVault 2015). There are three principle investigate
methods of insight including positivism, authenticity and interpretivism look into rationalities. In
any case, the idea of the research methods of insight has been created structure the epistemology.
The positivism investigate theory has been centered around the work dependent on the noticeable
social substance (Marczyk, DeMatteo and Festinger 2017). The research methodology can be
utilized for the improvement of the research. Likewise, positivism look into reasoning has been
created with philosophyal and quantifiable information. There has been a factual research done
in the positivism look into reasoning for social occasion information and data for this research.
Nonetheless, authenticity can be circulated in two subsets including direct authenticity and basic
authenticity. The two spotlights on distinguishing reality behind the presence of information.
Another kind of research reasoning has been interpretivism inquire about philosophy. This part
of epistemology has been centered on the distinction among social and human elements. The
utilization of interpretivism philosophy has been relied upon social components and life.
The researcher has chosen positivism theory as it is valuable for the research consider. The
choice of positivism has concentrated on the expected information to be utilized in recognizing
factors in charge of cyberbullying for females. The research has not picked authenticity and

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
interpretivism approach as research has been constrained to investigation of gathered information
and not conveying another idea or informational index. Thusly, the choice of positivism has been
suitable for the research.
3.2 Research Approach
So as to keep up a legitimate arrangement, a proper methodology is required. Research
approach helps in giving a graphic methodology in the advancement of the speculation in the
research. It helps in giving expansive suppositions in the point by point information
accumulation approach (Choy 2014). There are for the most part three sorts of research approach
including deductive, inductive and adductive methodology. The deductive methodology has been
centered on the dismemberment of set of theory required for affirmation or dismissal in the
exposition (Silverman 2016). The choice of deductive methodology has been empowering
researcher for coordinating the research in an authentic way. The research has been founded on
the elements influencing females by digital tormenting over the internet based life has been
broke down. The utilization of the correct research approach has helped in social occasion
information and data in regards to the research point (McCusker and Gunaydin 2015). In this
manner, this research has been founded on the deductive methodology as fundamental theory,
perception and affirmation has been primary piece of the thought.
Abductive research approach helps in clarifying fragmented perceptions and amazing
actualities in research (Noble and Smith 2015). The measure of bare pictures transferred to
online networking stages have been expanding as of late. Juvenile females and young ladies have
been feeling in safe over those social media stages due to digital harassing.
The research has chosen inductive methodology for this research for breaking down components
of digital harassing for females over social media. The point has been identified with the

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
quantitative methodology in the information gathering technique. The research has been founded
on recognizing answers for a lot of research questions and accordingly, choice of inductive
research approach has been legitimately defended.
3.3 Research Design
Research design has been a significant component of the research as it centers on ID of
set of strategies and systems set up together for utilization of apparatuses and instruments. It has
been characterized as efficient methodology used by researcher for looking at a particular
research examine (Neuman 2013). The research plan for this research should be suitable for
giving legitimate manual for the researcher in information gathering and investigation technique.
There are three kinds of research design including explanatory, exploratory and descriptive
research structure. The exploratory research design centers around different parts of an research
contemplate that has been founded on this research subject. This sort of research design alludes
to investigating different parts of the research (Brown and Stowers 2013). In any case, this does
not give any clarification and end to the properties of the research consider. The utilization of
exploratory research design has been helping in giving an appropriate needs in the research. The
informative research design centers around clarifying distinctive parts of the research consider
(Uprichard 2013). This kind of research design does not give any end to these parts of the
research. Elucidating research design has been centered on about what of the research venture.
Subsequently, the research has chosen illustrative research plan.
The utilization of distinct research design has been chosen particle this research ponder.
This research design has helped in breaking down the variables causing digital tormenting of
females over the social media. It has been giving appropriate instruments and methods to
dissecting the research issue. A few issues over social media identified with digital savagery for

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
females have been distinguished utilizing this research plan. The research has had the capacity to
gather information and data in regards to look into point.
3.4 Data Collection technique
Data Collection technique has been an important part of the research. Data collection
method has been of two types including primary and secondary data collection method. Primary
data collection method deals with statistical data collection from online surveys. The secondary
data collection method deals with collecting data from secondary sources including online
journals, articles and books. This research has used primary data collection method for collecting
data and information related to research. Online surveys have been created using Google forms.
3.5 Sampling Method and Size
The inspecting strategy examines about the procedures utilized for choosing members for
the research. The two sorts of examining technique have been likelihood testing and non-
likelihood inspecting strategy (Mitchell and Jolley 2013). The populace chose for the online
overview has been 220 internet based life clients. Be that as it may, the example estimate chose
for the online study has been 100 internet based life clients. The inspecting has been finished
utilizing non-likelihood irregular testing strategy. The inspecting has been done as the vast
majority of members have not legitimately addressed polls. There have been 8 close finished
inquiries incorporated into the review poll. This poll has been readied utilizing Google Forms
and transferred over the web utilizing a few online life stages including Facebook, Instagram,
Twitter and LinkedIn. Different answers have been gathered from the structure against those
overview polls. These answers have been considered as information and data for the research
think about.

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
3.6 Data Analysis Method
Information Analysis has been of two sorts including qualitative and quantitative
information research. Qualitative information research incorporate a scope of procedures that
have been founded on grouping of components on different characteristics and properties. In
qualitative information investigation, information has been gathered from auxiliary sources
including on the web diaries, books, s and legislative databases (Novikov and Novikov 2013).
Thusly, qualitative information research centers around exploratory research structure in an
unstructured manner. For information gathering technique in qualitative investigation,
researchers need to pose open finished inquiries. Be that as it may, in this research, close finished
inquiries have been posed to the members (Salaberry and Comajoan 2013). Subsequently,
quantitative information research strategy has been utilized in this research. The qualitative
information research strategy manages the non-factual information. This classification of
information investigation has been for the most part attempted on account of auxiliary
information gathering technique. The example measure for this sort of information investigation
used to be little.
Quantitative Data Analysis has been centered on the essential information gathering
strategy. The general diagram of the quantitative information research is about the utilization of
factual information identified with the research subject (Flick 2015). For this situation, there has
been necessity of measurable information and data and essential information accumulation has
been chosen (Brannen 2017). In this manner, the research has chosen quantitative information
research technique. The introduction of information and results have been finished utilizing
diagrams, tables and outlines. The research has been finished utilizing Likert Scale extending
from 1 to 5.

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
3.7 Ethical Consideration
Each philosophical research has been related with different arrangement of principles and
morals of scholarly committees. In this way, this research has been following all the moral
contemplations included. Information and data has been verified under the Data Protection
technique 1998 (Bernard 2017). It has been important to keep secrecy and security of members
of the research amid directing research. It has been duty of the individuals from the research and
members to keep security amid the conduction of the research think about (Walter and Andersen
2013). Results and results have been not been shared and distributed before the culmination of
the research (Punch 2013). It has been a basic point to take authorization from members to gather
information from them. They have not been compelled to stay in the research till its fulfillment.
Members have been kept allowed to leave the research whenever and place. Information and data
have not been altered amid information research technique. There have been straightforwardness
kept up in the information gathering process with appropriate moral thought amid the research

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
Chapter 4: Data Findings and Analysis
4.1 Quantitative Data Analysis
Quantitative data analysis method deals with data that has been collected using primary
data analysis method. There have been eight close ended questions provided in online survey.
The survey questions have been mentioned below with data collection.
Question 1: Please specify your gender
Options Responses Responses % Respondents
Male 62 62% 100
Female 38 38% 100
Figure 4.1.1: Gender
Analysis: According to graph and charts, 62% of the participants are males and 38 % of the
participants are females. Therefore, males have been interested in using social media than
females.
Question 2: What is your age?

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
Options Responses Responses % Respondents
Below 20 years 17 17% 100
21-30 years 29 29% 100
31-40 years 19 19% 100
41-50 years 19 19% 100
Above 51 years 16 16% 100
Figure 4.1.2: What is your age?
Analysis: According to graphs and charts, 29% of the participants are of age between 21 to 30
years. 19% of the participants have been of 31-40 years of age. Therefore, it can be analysed that
most of the social media users have been of young age. Young generation has been using social
media at a large scale.
Question 3: Which social media do you prefer the most?
Options Responses Responses % Respondents

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
Twitter 15 15 % 100
Facebook 31 31 % 100
Instagram 15 15 % 100
Snap Chat 19 19 % 100
Whatsapp 20 20 % 100
Figure 4.1.3: Which social media do you prefer the most?
Analysis: According to the table and chart, 31 % of the participants have been preferring
Facebook. 20 % of the participants have preferred Whats App as social media platform. This
data shows that most of the social users have been using Facebook, Whats app and Instagram as
social media platform. Therefore, the popularity of Facebook has been more than other social
media platforms in the market. The association between clients far surpasses sharing just
physical areas as it additionally includes sharing normal interests and exercises. These
inescapable apparatuses are a test to protection. LBSN clients distribute their data without
thinking about the security issues related, for example, anybody will almost certainly track their
whereabouts and could undoubtedly stalk them. In March 2012, Foursquare needed to deal with
the Russian-manufactured application named Girls Around Me and according to the name

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
recommends the application utilized Foursquare's API to show and channel individuals
dependent on their topographical position and sexual orientation. It arranged a rundown and
afterward utilized the data to look for those young ladies that had the connection between both
these records and after that their data was passed on to the clients of the application. One more
issue identified with is 'select in' versus 'quit' default settings.
Question 4: How much time do you spend over social media?
Options Responses Responses % Respondents
Less than one hour 13 13 % 100
2-3 hours 23 23 % 100
4-5 hours 28 28 % 100
5-6 hours 17 17 % 100
More than 7 hours 19 19 % 100
Figure 4.1.4: How much time do you spend over social media?
Analysis: According to charts and tables, 28 % of the participants have been using social media
for 4-5 hours. 23% of the participants have been spending 2-3 hours in a day. This shows that

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
most of the users have been spending their 2-5 hours daily over social media in a day. This have
been creating addiction of social media among generations. As analyzed earlier, most of the
users have been using Facebook as social media platform. Young generations have little
knowledge about Facebook and upload all personal data over Facebook with less privacy. This
become target for hackers to hack their accounts and breach out personal information. As
revealed in Microsoft Research "a LBSN does not just mean adding an area to a current
interpersonal organization with the goal that individuals in the social structure can share area
implanted data, yet in addition comprises of the new social structure made up of people
associated by the interdependency got from their areas in the physical world just as their area
labeled media , for example, photographs, video, and writings".
Question 5: Why do you use social media?
Options Responses Responses % Respondents
To connect with
friends
20 20 % 100
To connect with new
people who have
similar interests
34 34 % 100
To express my
opinion or share my
knowledge on a
subject
21 21 % 100
For business purpose 14 14 % 100
I don't use social
media
11 11 % 100

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
Figure 4.1.5: Why do you use social media?
Analysis: As per graph and chart, 34% of the participants have been using social media for
connecting with new people having similar interest. 21 % of the participants have been using
social media for expressing their opinion and share their knowledge on subject. Therefore, in
doing this some users used to share their emotional feelings and data over the social media.
Hackers might blackmail them emotionally and any risk can occur. A pick in situation alludes to
such default settings where a specific stage requires its clients to join a specific administration so
as to be profited by it. Subsequent to joining the administration, just the supplier is permitted to
get to the client's information and to offer the administration. A quit situation is to have a default
setting where a stage incorporates all clients as the recipients. Clients have the alternative to
change the settings themselves on the off chance that they don't need the administration. A case
of quit situation in LBSN is given by Facebook Messenger for Android and iPhone.
Question 6: Have you ever been accused of online bullying?
Options Responses Responses % Respondents
Yes 38 38 % 100
No 40 40 % 100

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
Rare 22 22 % 100
Figure 4.1.6: Have you ever been accused of online bullying?
Analysis: According to the graph and chart, 38 % of the participants answered that they have
been accused of online bullying. However, 40% have said they have not been accused of online
bullying. 22% said that they have been rarely accused of online bullying. Therefore, it can be
analysed that there are number of users who have been accused of online bullying over social
media. There have been several cases reported about online bullying to users of social media
through various means. Facebook has been condemned for its hacks in security issues. For
instance, in August 2007, the code, which was utilized to get to Facebook's home and pursuit
page as clients perused the site, was made open. In November 2009, Facebook propelled a
framework named Beacon that assisted outsider sites with including a by Facebook on their
destinations and was sending data about the activities of the client on their site to Facebook,
stimulating colossal security concerns. In June 2011, Facebook concocted programmed facial
acknowledgment highlight named "Label Suggestions". This component makes a correlation
between recently transferred pictures and those of the client's companions and after that
recommends photograph labels. European Union information assurance controllers were of the

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
feeling that if protection rules are disregarded it would research the component. Facebook
representing the component said that if a client needs he could incapacitate the element. Area
based informal organizations are a piece of Location based administrations. It alludes to the
connection being made by GPS that is Global Positioning System that tracks client's area. They
are alluded to as Geosocial Networking.
Question 7: Have you ever faced any privacy challenges over social media?
Options Responses Responses % Respondents
Yes 35 35 % 100
No 36 36 % 100
Rare 29 29 % 100
Figure 4.1.7: Have you ever faced any privacy challenges over social media?
Analysis: According to graph and chart, 35 % of the participants have faced privacy challenges
over social media. 36 % of the participants have not faced privacy issues over social media. 29 %
of the participants have rarely faced privacy issues over social media. This can be analyzed from
the chart that there have been users who have faced privacy challenges over Social media. Users

40
SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
have ben uploading all their daily updates over the social media. This have been creating risks
for users to maintain their data over social media. Cyber-attacks have been increased over recent
years. Many users have been complaining about loss of their personal data and internet over the
internet. The major problem faced by users have been leak and misuse of their personal
information on other illegal work.
Question 8: What type of challenges faced by you over social media?
Options Responses Responses % Respondents
Cyber Bullying 24 24 % 100
Sex Chat 25 25 % 100
Fake Ids 16 16 % 100
Pornography 18 18 % 100
Advertisements Spam 17 17 % 100
Figure 4.1.8: What type of challenges faced by you over social media?
Analysis: According to chart and graph, 25% of the participants have been facing sex chat over
various social media including Facebook. 24% of the participants have been facing cyber

41
SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
bullying over the social media. Sex chat has been common issue with female users over
Facebook. There have been many Fake Ids created over Facebook and other social media
platforms that have been sending sex messages to females using fake ids. Female users have
been harassed sexually over social media. Various nude pictures and videos related o
pornography used to be send to female users that create cyber harassment to them. Male users
have been bullied from fake female accounts over different social media accounts.

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
Chapter 5: Conclusion and Recommendations
5.1 Conclusion
Social media is an appropriate gathering of various channels of online correspondence
that have been committed for taking contributions from network for teaming up and sharing
substance. These sites have been committed with long range informal communication
discussions, interpersonal interaction, small scale blogging and other online networking types.
Web-based social networking has turned into a piece of the human life. The vast majority of the
youths have been dynamic on different online networking stages. They used to share their own
subtleties over various internet based life stages including Facebook, Twitter, Snap talk,
Instagram and WhatsApp. Consequently, security and protection of information has turned into a
difficult issue over these internet based life stages. There have been different cases revealed
identified with rupture of protection and security of information and data of clients over internet
based life. Web-based social networking has been turning into a necessary piece of clients in
reality. A large portion of the clients have been dynamic via web-based networking media sites
each day. Clients have been setting their day by day life exercises over the Social media. Online
life has acquired different progressive changes everywhere throughout the world. The driving
components for the appropriation of Social media have been logically getting to legitimate
usefulness and adaptability of social advancements.
There have been different restrictions and difficulties looked over internet based life.
Clients have been confronting security and private issues over online networking. There have
been different cases revealed over the web-based social networking identified with protection
and security of individual information of clients. This has been turning into another danger over

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SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
internet based life. The two guys and females have been confronting digital harassing issues over
web-based social networking. The serious issue talked about in this exploration has been the
security and protection issues looked by clients over online networking. The web has been
extending its development over different ventures and clients. A large portion of the clients have
been exercises over the Social media and sharing their own and every day exercises over the
internet based life stages. This has turned into an issue with respect to wellbeing and security of
their own information transferred over Social media stages. Numerous looks into have detailed
that their e have been increment in the digital dangers over Social media. Different internet based
life stages have been confronting information rupture issues. Numerous clients have been griping
about loss of their own information and web over the web. The serious issue looked by clients
have been hole and abuse of their own data on other unlawful work. The utilization of Social
media has been expanding every day. Hence, the digital security hazard has been expanding over
Social media stages. Online networking give stage to imparting individual data to other people.
There has been absence of mindfulness among clients in regards to sharing their own data over
internet based life. In this manner, this make a tremendous risk for misfortune and abuse of
individual data over the web.
This research will be done recognize the explanations for protection and security rupture
of information and data clients over online networking. The point of the research will center in
what degree do online life clients are thinking about their protection issues amid sharing their
own data over web-based social networking stages. In this manner, there have been infringement
of different moral structures over the web-based social networking. This exploration has been
centered on recognizing the issues looked by individuals over online life. This research has been

44
SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER PEOPLE’S PRIVACY
done at social dimension for understanding their perspectives about their utilization over online
life.
5.2 Recommendations
There have been various recommendations that can be helpful in minimizing privacy threat over
social media.
Limit audience for sharing information with: Before sharing data and information, user
need to customize their settings for visibility of shared data so that user can keep strangers out.
This will help in increasing security and privacy of data and information of users.
Limit amount of personal information posted: Users need not to post private information
over social media that makes vulnerable. Users should review their posts before uploading to
social media.
Changing passwords: Users need to change their passwords on a regular basis. This helps
in strengthening security of the social media. Changing password helps in maintaining a keen
approach in increasing security of data and information.
5.3 Future work
This research has focused on privacy issues faced by users over social media. The view
of people related to their privacy has been discussed in the research. In future, researchers might
research on factors that have been causing such privacy issues over social media.

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