Social Media Police: The Way of the Future

Being careful about what you post online is a lesson that many people have had to learn the hard way, whether it be for applying for a job, avoiding stalkers, or simply trying to stay in the good graces of your significant other’s family. Now it appears as if there is another interested party looking at your Facebook pictures: insurance companies. Insurance investigators are looking at user profiles on social media sites to analyze liability, and it appears that anything public is fair game. For example, if someone enjoys skydiving or spelunking and frequently posts pictures about it, they could face negative repercussions as to what their insurance coverage looks like. In a world where companies are able to pull all of the data about yourself from online and construct a timeline of your life, this development is no surprise; however, it does highlight the caution people should take when they make posts online.

Personally, I am not sure whether or not this is going too far. It is somewhat difficult to emphasize with the consumer argument that these sort of practices are intrusive when the content itself is being posted to a public forum. While it is very easy to tell people to just be smart about what they post, a more realistic solution might be for people to look at their privacy settings for each of their social media accounts and to adjust accordingly. It has gotten to the point where if anything posted on social media contradicts with information you have disclosed previously, you could face damaging consequences. As great as social media is in connecting people and allowing them to share experiences, developments like this shed a light on how it can be used against people.