I’m worried about how they might be used.
I live and breath social media. My job revolves around social media. I know what my friends and family are doing with their lives because of social media. I’m an addict.
I am also pregnant. In about 22 weeks, I’m going to have a baby. If the photos of my dogs on my Instagram are anything to go by, that baby will be seen by the world before they are seen by many of my friends and family.
This is actually very normal, but is it safe? That’s the question that keeps playing over and over in my mind when I can’t sleep thanks to Bump.
Recently in the US, Brittany Champagne found private and personal photos of her 8-year-old daughter on a fake Instagram account with links to online pornography. Turns out, those photos originally posted on her private Facebook account were everywhere.
"We’ve had the photos pulled down from over 20 sites, but they’re on even more where I couldn’t find a way to get them down,” she tells Yahoo.
The even scarier part is Champagne thought all her privacy settings were set to maximum. "I found out after this happened that my pictures weren’t as private as I thought they were, I guess my settings weren’t right. It’s humiliating," she confesses.
Sure, you can blame Champagne for not keeping up with the regular privacy changes. But the reality is that anything put online has the potential to be shared.
How do you know what privacy setting your friend who likes and comments on your photo has?
How do you know your sibling isn't going to share your photo of your newborn on their public Facebook page with a caption, "Love my new niece"?
You also don't realise how much data is attached to that image, things like your location, for instance.