We have previously written about the risks of using social media. Back then, the focus was on how users’ data is collected and sold. In this post, we move on to looking at other dangers that meet children and adults, digital safety and pitfalls on Facebook. Then you know what you’re getting into by using the page.
Facebook can store your card information without your knowledge
Many “free” games on the web today offer content that you as a player have to pay to access. Children who play Angry Birds or Petville, for example, are drawn to pay for access to things in the games they might not otherwise be able to use. If the children pay with their parents’ credit cards, there will be problems. This is why pitfalls on Facebook makes digital safety is so important.
Politiken wrote in February about how Facebook had known for a long time that games on their platform automatically stored credit card information after just one purchase. When the children logged back on the games, they could – often without knowing it – spend loose on their parents’ money. In extreme cases, up to £40,000 was spent on parents’ credit cards.
Despite Facebook being aware of the problem, they didn’t immediately respond – Maybe because Facebook gets a portion of the amounts paid in apps they support. The case shows that if you have just once used your credit card online, you have a risk of abuse, perhaps even with the website’s knowledge.
Facebook leverages your likes
Getting a like on social media makes you happy. We love getting confirmation – and it can that someone push a button, give us. But there’s reason to be worried about the like button.
The BBC has previously written about likes focusing on Facebook’s like button. The article tells about how the hunt for likes affects our self-esteem. But also about how likes are used to build up knowledge of users. If you like 70 things, a professor can know you better than your friends do.
So big companies like Facebook can figure out your personality and lives as long as they have likes to assume. It also shows here how careful one should be when something as innocent as clicking the mouse can reveal a lot about you. Sitting at the keyboard noting information about yourself is not necessary for Facebook to find out who you are. Because you’re what you’re reacting to.
Facebook offered children to buy their data
If we jump back to children’s use of social media, there continue to be pitfalls. Facebook was in the cross over earlier this year over its app Facebook Research.
The app wasn’t one users had to pay for. On the contrary, Facebook would pay up to $20 a month to have the app on its phone. The app gave Facebook free access to all one’s data. The data facebook could then use to keep an eye on how competitors are trying to reach users.
Children as young as 13 were given the offer to install the app in return for the little money. Facebook itself saw no problem with it, because users had consented to their data being collected. The question then is whether children can consent to it.