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  • Essay / Social networks: beneficial or harmful? - 1239

    With technological advancements in a short period of time, they have impacted the world in many ways, including the way the world communicates and our lifestyles. One of the many revolutionary inventions or developments is called social networking sites (SNS). Social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and many others are where people gather on the Internet, create a personalized profile about themselves, and interact with people from all over the world. Due to the lack of parental supervision between the ages of fourteen and seventeen, which is one of the largest demographic groups using social networking sites, these teens may be subject to mature material. Young adolescents between the ages of fourteen and seventeen should not be allowed to have a profile on social networking sites because they do not have the ability to make proper logical decisions. With the level of exposure teenagers face today by joining the social media trend. , they often forget the dangers of social media such as stalkers and pedophiles, who can use the sites as a major tool of commerce. These dangers can befriend naive teenagers and lure them into dangerous situations. For example, Raymond Wang had a friend harassed by a stranger through one of the social networking sites. This stalker acquired private information about her through Facebook, and got to the point where he sent her threatening or perverted letters to her actual mailbox, detailing what he would do to her. "It's really affected her a lot because now she's afraid other bullies will do the same and she doesn't want that to happen or anything to happen to her." (Wang 19) Even if users have the option to make their profile private, the threat remains that stalkers will be able to gather enough information about the person's whereabouts. Another similar incident happened to Regina Chau, a member of a social networking site dedicated to the raver lifestyle, Plurlife. When she first joined her friends offline, she loved everything about SNS, but "[where] most of the people you accept into your friends list would probably be strangers." (Chau 18) she had made friends with someone she didn't know offline and one of those "friends" had become a little too friendly with her; “He kept asking me if I wanted to meet him at the next event. I found this a bit creepy and didn't respond to him afterwards...