Social Media is a glorious thing that allows people from all cross the world to connect with each other and share their thoughts and opinions, as well as letting friends and family keep in touch wherever they are, and letting people keep tabs and interact with their favorite idols, celebrities, brands etc.

But social media isn’t all just happy land, as social media can have a dark and dangerous side to it, as lots of people online who use social media use it for malicious purposes that can range from misinforming and misleading people, to actually putting peoples lives at risk. Today in this post ill be exploring the dark side of social media, and the dangers within it.

FAKE NEWS

Some people on the internet use social media to spread fake news, whether that would be spreading links of fake news articles on Facebook where most people will only look at headlines instead of clicking the link, and manipulating a series of video clips to show event that never actually occurred. Many people will do these sorts of hings to get attention, and it fools people that don’t know any better into believing things that are not true. Take for example, the massive influx of myths and lies that people online are spreading about the about the recent Covid-19 virus, claiming that they have the cure to the virus, or that taking ibuprofen actually makes it worse.

SCAMS & SKETCHY LINKS

Many people online will use social media to scam people of their details. This can be from sending links to sketchy websites that will request you to put in your details such as login email, usernames and passwords, to bank account details and card numbers, to personal details such as living addresses and postcodes. These people will then use these details to steal money from the bank accounts of unsuspecting victims, as well as logging into peoples social media accounts to send more sketchy links to the victim’s friends on social media. they could also use the living addresses of victims to threaten and blackmail them into doing things such as sending them money.

ONLINE PREDATORS

Perhaps the worst of all, people online will use social media to lure unsuspecting young people into very dangerous and life threatening situations. These people will pretend to be someone who they are not, like a 42 year old man in his basement pretending to be a 16 year old high school student. The fake online personas that they created, they will chat with young people on social media sites and make the young person on the other end believe that they are in a relationship with someone who is around the same age as them. This could lead into very dangerous and life threatening situations for the young person if the online predator if they and the predator on the other side of the screen arrange to meet up somewhere, in which the predator could act out on their urges and do something to the young victim.

Its important that we all be wary while using social media. Many people on the internet will have malicious intent, but if we all be careful and use commonsense, we can keep ourselves safe when were all using social media sites, as well as the entire internet in fact.

Stay safe out there!

1960’s

The first wide area computer network was created, the very first email ever gets sent, and Arpent is born.

1970’s

Network control protocol is designed, email is introduced, transmission control protocol/internet protocol is designed, the first modem PC is developed and the bulletin board system is developed and spam is born.

1980’s

The very first emoticon is born, the word “internet” is used instead of the word “arpent”, the Domain name system is born, Cisco ships its first router and World.std.com becomes the first commercial provider of dial-up access.

1990’S

Tim Berners-Lee invents the widely used HTML, the world wide web goes mainstream, mp3 becomes a standard form of audio, the first graphical internet browser is born, multiple popular websites like Yahoo, eBay and Amazon ae born as well as Google.

2000’s

The Dot.com bubble bursts, many popular websites like YouTube and Wikipedia are born and social media is on the rise thanks to the likes of MySpace and Facebook, the web 2.0 era begins the very first iPhone is created and there are now more online devices than the number of people on earth.

2010’s

Many more popular websites are born like Instagram are born, Netflix launches its online movie streaming service in multiple countries, smartphones are on the rise like never before, more smart devices are created such as smart TVs, watches aswell as home speakers, and Disney make a bunch of garbage Star Wars movies that are worse than the Prequels.

2020’s

Someone decided to eat an animal they bought from a dodgy fish market in China so the whole world has to suffer because of it.

4chan is an online image board website where people are able to post anonymously on many different image boards about topics such as anime, video games, music, politics, to more… risqué topics.

4chan receives around more than 27 million monthly users, as well as approximately 800,000 posts made each day by its users.

Since 4chan allows its users to post anonymously onto its message boards, users are not required to register and make an account, unlike most social media platforms, although users have the ability to give themselves a nickname when posting if the chose to do so. Uses can also bump up posts and threads to the top of message boards by replying and interacting with them, and older, inactive threads get deleted automatically, making room for new posts.

4chan could be described as a hub of internet subculture, with its community having been able to form and spread popular and prominent internet memes like rick-rolling and rage comics, as well as its movements of activism and politics, such as Anonymous and the Alt right.

When 4chan was first launched in 2003 as a western equivalent to a Japanese image board website, it only contained a single message board about anime. Today 4chan has about 70 different message boards about a wide range of topics and interests.

Pros: It allows people to post on message boards that revolve around topics that they are interested in without people knowing who they are on the website as the websites allows its users to post anomalously.

Cons: The look and display of the website itself looks dated in comparison to other social media platforms, and looks as if the website has never had a visual update since its launch in 2003. The website is also home to some of the most toxic people on the internet due to the anonymity that the website offers to all its users, so users can be as nasty and hateful as the want with virtually no consequence, and the website has also been tied up in quite allot of controversy over the years.

Twitter is a micro-blogging and social network platform where users can follow people and upload posts that are called “tweets” that’ll show up on heir follower’s timelines, as well as interact with other user’s tweets by liking and retweeting them.

Twitter has boasted quite recently that the social media platform has had 330 million monthly active users, as well as having 145 active users everyday.

As well as being able to follow users and post and interact with tweets, Twitter also allows users to directly message other users, much like other social media platforms, and twitter also allows for its users to create group chats and invite another users, which much like direct messaging, is also a common feature among social media platforms.

One thing that is great about twitter is than many celebrities and idols along with popular people on the internet, as well brands and companies have twitter accounts, so users can follow their favourite celebs and brands to see what they’re up to and check up on their announcements and upcoming events.

Pros: It allows people to check and keep up on their favourite celebrities, sports players, artists and bands, brands and companies, internet content creators etc.

Cons: Twitters DMCA and spam violation systems are often manipulated by users to force the suspension of one’s account, and when an account is suspended, twitter will say that it had violated its terms of service, without specifying which rules the user has allegedly violated.

Amino is like a network of communities where people can create and join all sorts of fandom’s and communities of the things they love, as well as connect with new people who have the same interests as them. Amino also allows for users to create their own communities based on their loves and interests.

Amino initially launched in 2014 with only just 47 communities available, but in 2016 with the launch of the Amino Community Manager app that allows users to create their own Amino communities, the number of communities on Amino had skyrocketed to over 2.5 million, with some of the biggest Amino communities having from 50,000 to over a million members.

Inside of an Amino community, users can make post related to the thing that said community is about, as well as share pictures and art, and also being able to create quizzes and polls. Much like other social media platforms, users can also like other users posts within their community, as well as leave comments on them. One thing that Amino dose quite differently compared to other social media platforms is that people can tip coins that they’ve bought or earned to other users for their posts.

Pros: Amino allows people to connect with many people that share the same interests as each other with its many communities that centre around all different topics, fandoms, hobbies, interests etc, and it also gives its users the power to create their own communities on amino, so if they cant find a community centered a certain topic, then they can make it.

Cons: with every user having the ability to create their own communities on Amino, you’ll likely find multiple communities that revolve around the same topic, which could seem unnecessary to some people, and allot of communities made by users have very little members, and are often inactive.

YouTube is an online video sharing platform which allows any folk like you and me to upload and share all sorts of video content to the site on their YouTube channel, and users can keep tabs on their favourite content creators, by subscribing to their YouTube channels.

Currently, YouTube has around 1.8 Billion users every month, and over 500 hours of video content get uploaded to the site every minute.

YouTube isn’t all just video content though, as much like other social media platforms, users can like ad dislike other people’s videos, as well as leaving comments too, and users can also share videos outside of YouTube and onto social media via sharing YouTube video links.

User can upload almost any type of video content they want, from vlogs, music and make-up tutorials, to tech reviews and gaming videos (as long as those videos are clean and kept inline with the YouTube community guidelines, as well as not infringing on any copyright)

Pros: It allows people to express themselves and channel their inner creativity, as for the most part there are virtually not limits to the type of video content users can upload and share onto the site.

Cons: With users having the ability to upload almost any type of video content they want, and with the mass amount of video content being uploaded to YouTube every minute, allot of that content will presumably be low effort rubbish, like Minecraft videos recorded by little kids who have access to mobile or tablet devices, to videos with misleading titles and thumbnails that trick the viewer into thinking the video is actually something else.