With more and more users signing up for sites such as Facebook and Myspace, it is changing the way these sites are used. Both Facebook and Myspace still mainly are used as social networking sites, where users can post information and pictures about themselves or can catch up with old friends. But also these sites have begun to become more then social networking sites, they have become tools for advertisers, divorce lawyers and job interviewers to find out information about you that you thought was private.
People seem to be forgetting that what they put on Facebook can easily be seen my millions in a matter of seconds. Pictures of a drunken night or a status about your not so nice feelings about your loved one or boss can come back and destroy your job or marriage. Facebook has begun to effect many marriages. Facebook makes it easy to connect with past flames, that begin to appear out of the wood work. In a recent study Facebook has been mentioned in 20% of divorces, this is a huge number considering how “new” Facebook is. A 2010 survey by the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers (AAML) found that four out of five lawyers reported an increasing number of divorce cases citing evidence derived from social networking sites in the past five years, with Facebook being the market leader.
Being a Facebook user also allows your private information to be viewed by advertisers. Facebook allows advertisers to view user’s likes or dislikes and what they are interested in to advertise more directly with that user. The add’s that users see on Facebook are put there directly for that specific user, if you like the film “Star Wars” then you are going to see adds selling “Star Wars” t-shirts. This brings up the question, how much of your information is private? The information being transmitted is one of Facebook's basic building blocks: the unique "Facebook ID" number assigned to every user on the site. Since a Facebook user ID is a public part of any Facebook profile, anyone can use an ID number to look up a person's name, using a standard Web browser, even if that person has set all of his or her Facebook information to be private. For other users, the Facebook ID reveals information they have set to share with "everyone," including age, residence, occupation and photos. The apps reviewed by the Wall Street Journal were sending Facebook ID numbers to at least 25 advertising and data firms, several of which build profiles of Internet users by tracking their online activities.