Social Networking: Boon or Bane

In part 1 of this write-up, we briefly discussed the growing
importance of social media and networking in today’s business and personal
environment. While there are many who swear by this recent (and a highly potent)
phenomenon, there is a growing number of users who after having burnt
themselves, speak in hushed tones about the disasters that have already struck
and the ones that are waiting to happen.

Notwithstanding the perils, most people are happy to join the
bandwagon. In general, if you ask anyone the real reasons for him or her joining
Facebook or Twitter, the responses you get will range between the standard of
“keeping in touch with friends”, “it’s hip”, “you have got to be in the groove”,
etc. Many are on the network for the heck of it (which in reality translates to
— due to peer pressure). Largely the popularity is due to the hype about social
media (including “if you are not on it, you are toast” types), and the fact
remains that most new joiners are clueless about what they are signing up for.

Interestingly, one recent statistic (which was proudly
reported in all leading forms of news media) suggests that teenagers, who (for
the record) are the most prolific users of social networking sites, post as many
as 100 status updates on their social networks.

Hmmm ! ! ! . . . 100 status updates . . . Considering that in
a day you have 24 hours, out of these 24 hours you eliminate 8 hours for your
natural instincts for food and sleep and . . ., the remainder is 16 hours.

In these balance 16 hours the user would have 960 minutes to
post these 100 odd messages. If that is the case, to send out 100 updates, the
required (run rate) frequency would be one update every 9.6 minutes. Wow ! ! ! !
That calls for an ‘AWESOME ! ! ! !’

No wonder these teenagers turn around and question the very
existence of life beyond Twitter and Facebook. There just isn’t any time left
for them to do anything else.

Any sane person would equate this awesome feat with
obsession. You may not believe this but do a search on Google (or Bing or Yahoo
for that matter) and you will find reports about the death of a toddler (there
could be more). Apparently the toddler died due to malnourishment. Apparently a
Japanese couple was so busy raising their virtual child on a social
network game that they forgot to feed their child in the real world. Surely now
the only word coming to your mind would be ‘SHOCKING’.

Here’s another example : Hordes of people while registering
with such sites, part with personal details (and that to in amazing detail mind
you). Details which by any rate are sensitive and of a personal nature. These
sites ask you who you are, where you live, what you do, when you do it. They
want to know how-when-where — with who . . . . blahblahblah . . . . They want
details of all your friends, relatives, acquaintances, etc. They will even do
the good thing of asking the same from all your connections. Without these you
are not ‘assimilated’ (sounds like the Blog in Star Trek — NG) or not a
‘part of the gang’. The depth of the information sought is more detailed than
some of the best KYC (know your
customer) checklists I have seen in the recent past.

You know what the best part of this is . . . . the user
concedes with most of these details (which are very sensitive personal)
willingly. So whats wrong with that ? ? ? ? Well for starters, nobody reads the
disclaimers, even worse most people can’t comprehend the perils of not doings so
before signing up . . . . yes It’s the part where the users accept the terms and
conditions without reading (let alone understanding the consequences). If you
ask me its only a matter of time before this information falls in the hands of
all those wrong sorts of people. Mind you this information in one form or the
other, at one time or the other, can fall in the hands of telemarketers,
scamsters, your boss or bosses and ofcourse (since this magazine is read by a
lot of tax practitioners) u know who. You’re thinking “THAT’S IMPOSSIBLE” or
“THAT’S EXAGGERATING IT A BIT TOO MUCH” . . . . is it ? ? ? ?

Lets take a simple example, say, Mr. A is also Mr. Popular on
the social network. He starts updating (speaking his mind). All the updates
instantly reach all the people connected to him. Similarly there would be other
people on his network who update their status. The natural response would be
that . . . . That’s the intention, they are my friends, colleagues, family . . .
. they wouldn’t do me any harm.

That, my friends, is the proverbial weakest link in the
chain. While Mr. A may have some control who is connected to his network
and who accesses his information, but the same cannot be said about the people
on his network. It may be that he is not very friendly with someone (could even
be his boss) and that someone is very chummy with someone else on A’s
‘controlled’ network. Mr. A may or may not be aware or might not even approve
(or for that
matter disapprove) of this. Needless to say that even a single slip-up by Mr. A
or his connection, would (very harshly) change their opinion about ‘the theory
of six degrees of separation’. Still don’t believe me, do you ? ?

OK here goes nothing . . . . if you read all the recent
reports on the ongoing spat between a certain Member of Parliament and the head
of a popular sport venture. Several media reports suggest that the entire
episode would never have assumed the proportions that it did, had it not been
for the ‘tweets’ between the two parties. Whats more these tweets (and many more
related to the other alleged misdemeanours) are likely to be used as evidence
against them (as I recall, one of the articles cited a similar spat about a
decade ago and how the parties involved could get away by denying everything,
but not this time, all due to the provisions of the Information Technology Act,
2000). The OUTCOME — the media now calls one a twit who tweeted too much while
the other party is waiting for the decision of the third umpire.

As stated earlier, depending on who has access to this
information, the user can be scammed, used and abused, taken advantage of, taken
to task —or all of above. Here’s another instance :

I’ve Been Robbed ! Western Union Me Money !

When you accept someone as your friend on the
net-work, he has access to most of your updates, your profile, your
pictures, adventures, friends, etc. Surely you trust someone as a friend
when you accept his invitation on Facebook or Twitter or else why would
you give an absolute stranger or an acquaintance access to your
personal information— you cant be that naïve ! ! ! ! Then one fine day,
you’re browsing around social networking site and suddenly one of your
friends IMs you to tell you that they’re stuck in another country,
they’ve been robbed, don’t have a wallet, and need money to get out of
the country. It’s a horrible situation, but what are the odds that they
found a computer to log on to in order to in-stant message you ?

So
what do you do . . . . you ask him for the details and do the good
thing (ahem ! ! ! not the smartest thing) and wire him the money. At
that moment you could be singing praises about how social net-working is
a boon, but it is more likely that when the true picture is revealed
the you may horrified by the fact that it was your folly due to which
you were scammed (i.e., scammed in one of the oldest scams on the
Internet).

How is it possible ? ? ? ? Its fairly simple actually.
All the scammer needs to do is (a) access to one account on the social
network, (b) collate all possible personal information, (c) list out all
the (gullible) ‘friends’ and then he can start the ball rolling.

In
this instance a hacker/scammer gains access to the account of a
(trusted) friend. He would know through the frequent status updates what
you and your friend are up to and how he can exploit you. The scammer
would thereafter, using one of the most common ways, manipulate others
for financial gain. This also called the London scam, or Western Union
scam. In most cases, users get fooled because the scammer (being
proficient in his art) will portray a very convincing picture about his
predicament. The scammer uses all the personal information (available on
the hacked user account as well as your account) to gain your
confidence (and not to mention. . . . your money).

Don’t believe me ? Run a search on Facebook or google, you will find that there are lots more like you.

While
these were limited examples, news reports are littered with other
‘disasters’ (reset password, sign up for contests, etc.) — you can
search Google for Facebook and Twitter scams to learn about more scams.
There are several examples of successful businesses shooting themselves
in the foot with social networking if one is really seriously
considering investing money on social media-based marketing.

Having
digested the above reality (not a reality show mind you or is it
reality show — cant tell the difference these days), the moot question
is whether social media and networking is as good as its cracked out to
be or is there something more than what meets the eye ? ? ? Is it really
worth all the time and energy or is this a big scam ? ? ?

While I
don’t have any definite answers, I do have these glaring instances
which force me to think twice (no connection to a book with the same
title— published by Havard Business Press) which bring out the darkside
of social networking and provide some basis as to why one should be
cautious of the brouhaha that’s being raised about social media and
networking.