Attorney warns of privacy risk when using social media

SOCIAL media has changed the way we interact with our friends and family. Most of us enjoy keeping them up to date on our lives, however many of us have come to discover that different social networks could also pose serious privacy risks. Northglen News recently spoke to Verlie Oosthuizen, an attorney and partner at Shepstone & Wylie (Durban) about the importance of privacy settings on social media networks.

Verlie specialises in employment law litigation in all forms and has developed further practice areas in Social Media Law and data protection compliance.

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Here’s what she had to say about the importance of privacy settings on social media.

1. Can anything uploaded by a Facebook user be used by other media companies for articles or media companies for a product without your consent?

“This will depend on the users privacy settings and controls, however in general terms the answer is yes in certain instances and your specific consent would not be required. Facebook has a “Statement of Rights and Responsibilities” (“the SRR”) which is the terms of service for all Facebook users. In terms of clause 2 of the SRR you own all of your content which you post on Facebook however you specifically give Facebook license to use that content subject to your specific privacy settings.

“However all content that is posted in a “Public” setting (e.g. your profile picture and name) you are allowing everyone including Facebook to access and use that information for as long as it is posted in that Public setting. The only time that the permission is revoked is when you deactivate your account and even then it is as though the information is in a “recycle folder”… it is not permanently deleted,” she said.

2. With regards to Facebook, would you advise people to look at their personal security settings to avoid things like this from happening?

“You can control the way your content is used and shared and accessed through your privacy and application settings. However certain information will always be public if you are a Facebook user such as your profile picture. It is suggested that you have very strong privacy settings if you do not want your content used or shared. If you do not want any Facebook information about you accessed or used you are better off deactivating your account.”

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3. If one finds themselves in this situation, what can they do?

“You will have to accept that certain content that you post on Facebook is in the public domain and can be used by anyone. Therefore you need to be vigilant that the information about you that is public is not something that you would object to being used by other people.”