Modern people start their day by logging into numerous online platforms.
“He records his daily life himself, and the platform spreads his records.” This is used as an expression in lifelogging. Lifelogging is the process in which people’s daily lives and hobbies are recorded in real-time and transmitted to others. That platform is called social media. While it is supposed to have the advantage of being a space where you can freely write down your thoughts and easily maintain social relationships, it has caused numerous problems that threaten the social safety net. Due to the nature of social networking sites (SNS), where people cannot see each other and share emotions face to face, responsibility for what people say and do can only be light.
There is a saying that the power of a group is scarier than that of an expert. On an SNS platform, where you can quickly form a group and collaborate, you can come across more of these things than you think. It is a massive opportunity for those who provide business services, and for many people, it is a convenient service that allows them to share their interests with many people. However, it has a huge impact when it goes in a negative direction. Fake news, incitement, blind malicious comments, and personal exposure are serious social problems. In particular, blind accusations against influencers (celebrities) and cyberbullying are destroying real people’s lives, but no solution has been found.
These problems are not limited to online. For example, some forces use crowd psychology and group power for personal gains. A bigger problem is that assimilated erroneous thoughts and behaviors do not stop online but quickly spread to offline behaviors.
A fragmentary example is the “Nth Room Case” or “Doctor’s Room” incident in 2020, in which individuals were exploited through blackmail and spreading of sexual video recordings, which were distributed and/or sold to numerous women in Korea through SNS. This case started on Twitter, and it is a shocking case of exploitation and sale of illegal videos by threatening weak individuals using their identities and weaknesses. What was even more problematic at the time was that the number of minors among the victims was high, as there were close to 1,000 victims.
Three perpetrators took the lead, but the number of perpetrators who distributed with them was estimated to be more than 5,000. Thus, it was an incident that caused secondary damage due to sharing through SNS and dissemination of personal information and had considerable difficulties in removing them from the Internet after the fact.
In a later interview, the perpetrators of the secondary distribution of illegal content were also telling unbelievable stories that they did not know was a crime.
Numerous experts pointed out that the starting point of this problem was, of course, the users because they feel weakly responsible for their words and actions online. If we interpret this differently, it means that if we do not meet in person, an ego lacking the ability to empathize with people, that is, an online persona will emerge. In addition, when a group lacks awareness of this responsibility, it can come up as a social problem. In small groups, cyberviolence, provocative content distribution, community- and national-level racism, and online activities of terrorist groups are examples. In other words, it can bring down individuals in small ways and approach it as a global threat in a broader sense.
With the onset of the untact (a blend of the prefix “un” and the word “contact”) society, people spend an increasing amount of time online. Moreover, in the future, information and communication, whether desired or unwanted, will develop further, and we will inevitably meet these problems. Recognizing that it has exerted greater power because it can be written easily and spread quickly and taking responsibility from an individual can lead the positive role of SNS in a more developed direction.
Social networking sites have led humanity to a newer world. They have allowed people to meet, revitalized businesses, and become a window that connects the world. However, as it is a new system, it has also caused new problems. However, humanity has continually developed by recognizing and solving problems. If we recognize these problems and use them in the direction of development, we will experience social evolution once again.
Reference list
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