Privacy

Evidence from articles and experience, new media is mainly beneficial. However, caution has to be taken when it comes to the internet particularly with the issue of privacy and confidentiality.

Privacy and confidentiality, two words we see a lot specially at the doctor’s office while filling out forms. Privacy is defined as “freedom from unauthorized intrusion: state of being let alone and able to keep certain esp. personal matters to self” (FindLaw Law Dictionary website). Deriving from the word confidentiality, confidential is “known or conveyed only to a limited number of people; marked by or indicative of intimacy, mutual trust, or willingness to confide esp. between parties one of whom is in a position of superiority or containing information whose unauthorized disclosure could be prejudicial to the national interest” (FindLaw Law Dictionary website).
These don’t only pertain to physical world but to the internet as well. With almost the entire world having access to the internet, one of new media’s means of sending information, privacy and confidentiality can be difficult to control. Anyone can put up ANYTHING (eg. Address, phone, full name, social security number) on it, which is the scary part. And it may not be intentional. A real life example of this is my friend’s full name, address and phone number were posted on our company website because there wasn’t a privacy policy. Of course, that was immediately taken care of but it took about a week. Even though it was taken off, people could still have seen it. Luckily, nothing bad came out of this; however, others may not have been so lucky.

Privacy and confidentiality isn’t limited to just one’s personal information. It’s anything someone doesn’t want others to see or reveal. Let’s take for example, the Twilight Saga’s author Stephanie Meyer. I think most of you are familiar or at the very least been exposed to the popular vampire teen series. In any case, she was writing the 5th book of the series when it was illegally posted online without her consent and knowledge. In her official website, she addressed the issue and wrote, “ I think it is important for everybody to understand that what happened was huge violation of my rights as an author, not to mention me as a human being” (from www.stephaniemeyer.com/midnightsun.html). The keyword here is violation, which is the main issue regarding privacy and confidentiality. She was in the process of writing a novel (private matters) which she shared to a selected few (confidential) but wasn’t ready to share with the public. Because of the way information travels on the internet, the unedited novel was easily and quickly posted and seen by many. With the given premise, her private and confidential rights were violated. She was wronged. Meyer went on to say what happened made her not want to continue, it affected the way she felt which consequently affected her writing.

There’s so much information out there; some are publicized and some aren’t meant to be made known by everyone. The latter is information that is should be kept private and confidential. By not doing so, is a violation of rights which affects a person’s life, thoughts and feelings. So, it is best to take caution with our own information as well as others.