Some broadband users undermining others' rights to privacy

It has been claimed by one industry expert that some broadband users that post personal and private details about themselves online are undermining others’ rights to privacy.

These days many of the millions of people that have access to broadband services use it for various types of entertainment, and this includes things such as going on social networking sites, going on blog sites such as Twitter, and posting or watching content on sites such as YouTube. However, one industry expert has claimed that the nature of the content that some people put on these sites could jeopardise privacy for the rest of us.

Academic, Dr Kieron O’Hara, claims that some broadband users these days are posting all sorts of personal and private information about themselves online. In the past this type of content may have been viewed by the friends and family of the person had they chosen to allow this but these days it is often viewed by millions of strangers from around the world.

Dr O’Hara claims that these people have started to create a blur in the line between what is classed as private and what is not. He said that people that posted such intimate details about their lives online were undermining the right to privacy for millions of others, and he said that people needed to be more aware of the type of content that they were putting online.

He stated: “If you look at privacy in law, one important concept is a reasonable expectation of privacy. As more private lives are exported online, reasonable expectations are diminishing.” He added: “When our reasonable expectations diminish, as they have, by necessity our legal protection diminishes.”

Source – BBC