Yesterday, for some reason I would not want to share, I found myself doing a lot of reading, mostly articles my 'followees' on Twitter linked me to. I read a good number of articles on Read Write Web and this has sent me wondering if Ghanaians have any concern about online security. Okay, so one of the major things I read about was the growing concern of some Americans about privacy issues on Facebook. Some have even gone to the extent of creating websites such as I'm not on Facebook to show their extreme displeasure with the social network. While I find that rather hilarious, Zuckerberg has made some statements that warrant some good amount of worry on the part of many people. A key one is "The age of privacy is over" (Zuckerberg, Jan 8, 2010.) Ironically, the world heard of the graduation-turn-wedding that he pulled off earlier this year. Was the age of privacy still over then?
Well, I would not really want to go deeply into my views about Zuckerberg and Facebook privacy. My concern is how very few Ghanaians are concerned about privacy. Should I say the rest do not care or they simply are ignorant? Walk into an Internet café and log into a pc. You would find that the last user did not sign out of his email or facebook account. For him, exhausting every second of his internet time is more important that signing out afterwards. Have they ever thought of the consequences of such actions? But like I said, it must be ignorance. It just has to be. Even managers in big institutions sign into their email and leave their office with a cleaner or even a visitor left behind. Should I say this educated man who has probably attained several degrees than I can dream of is also ignorant of security? Very worrying, very disturbing.
I recently sent a message via Whatsapp to a friend asking for another friend's number. He replies with this friend's number and the next question that comes is "By the way, who is this please?" Seriously?! He just gave a friend's number to a 'stranger'. Now, it makes me wonder if I am safe too! That, however is the attitude of many Ghanaians. So I ask again: is it ignorance?
A lot of work is left to be done concerning issues of not only Internet security but general security practices in Ghana. Whose work is that?
Well, I can start, you can too. I hope you log out off your email and facebook page today.
The issue is this, no one in Ghana has been hit by someone breaking into their computers before.I doubt we have laws in Ghana to check internet security and even fraud. We want to prove we have grown technologically but we left loopholes behind us..
ReplyDeleteCheryl, you should speak to my brother. He's nuts about privacy.
ReplyDeleteI just feel nobody thinks of another person hacking into their accounts. Such issues are rare in Ghana. However internet users must be educated on issuea as these. Go girl, begin your campaign
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