Facebook and Privacy

Do the users of facebook have a lowered expectation of privacy? In my opinion, yes they do. When you sign up for facebook you are willingly exposing not only your personal information to the databases of facebook, but to the entire network. Facebook is a network created by college students in order to better connect students, however, those who overexpose themselves in this online community have a lowered expectation to privacy. Facebook offers a privacy setting that users can utilize, however it does not completely eliminate strangers from accessing your information. Especially now that facebook has opened its doors to everyone, unlike in the past when only college students had access, a users expectation of privacy is lowered. Police, parents and teachers have the right to be on the network, and to access any users information. Many school police have begun to use facebook as a means of patrolling their student body, and they have every right to. You should not post pictures or messages that you do not want authorities to see. The internet is a public space, and therefore your actions are not private, and are prosecutable. People who have hundreds of pictures of themselves are definitely overexposing themselves in a public place, and if their pictures show illegal activity then there should be repercussions. There have been many cases in which students have claimed that their expectations to privacy have been violated, however none of these cases should "hold water". Anytime you do something in the public eye you are being watched, and you are aware of it, so why are your actions of facebook any different? They aren't! While some can argue that they have taken measures to secure their information through facebook security options, they can not account for someone who does have access to their information allowing someone else to use their account. Facebook in theory is a wonderful creation that allows for people to keep in touch with and meet new people, however it also opens up its users to a lowered expectation of privacy. People need to taken down pictures of themselves, and not post all of their actions on their homepage, in order to begin to gain back some expectation of privacy. Until the users of facebook begin to realize that they are only hurting themselves and their reputation every time they sign on, their expectation of privacy is only going to continue to dwindle.