“Big Brother is watching you”. Many people have heard of George Orwell’s prophetic novel “1984”. In most high schools, this is required reading. The book has a plot which revolves around one man’s struggle with the government and how observant it is. The world of 1984 is one where where no one can do anything without being watched. This is what he believed the year 1984 in real life would be like. In the book, nearly every street corner has some sort of camera, and the police have the authority to just barge into someone’s house unannounced to make sure they weren’t up to no good. And by no good this means expressing opinions and enjoying free will. Orwell was a visionary for his time, and many people believed his predictions would come true; the government would officially take over.

This scared the citizens of that era, around the 1950’s. They grew up in a time where they did not question authority, and this meant the government. This surrender of their will to their government would have made it easy for them to be controlled. Since at about this time  technology was going places that mankind could never have foreseen, Orwell’s fictional world seemed more imminent than ever. Ever since America broke off from the British rulers those decades ago, we have always had a healthy skepticism for any sort of government power. Although the government is not all controlling, people still are prone to views of it taking over and of martial law. The biggest problem and fear people have though is with privacy, and to this extent the government is the least of their worries.

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Creative criminals: with its nice alliterative ring, it sounds like a harmonious title of a reality show. Or perhaps some blooper reel where the “creative” is in a less reverent sense. This is nothing to do with television though, but rather another medium: technology. The human race had its humble roots with a barbaric caveman who first struck fire and was maddened and frightened by its implications, although he probably did not know what “implications” were. Soon enough though, or really through millions of years of natural selection, we found ourselves in the year 1950. At this point technology is just making its strong debut, with the radio and the television dominating the airwaves and creating sparks in the minds of the greats who will bring us even more advanced technology later.

Anonymous Proxy to avoid identity theft

Although we did not know it the abstract concept of a grassroots link between users would be manifested to the tangible, yet paradoxically intangible, Internet. This system allowed people to set up their own sites via the WWW service, and brought about many great things. Unfortunately, it is through the Internet that we find ourselves the victims of some of the most creative criminals.

The creation of MySpace, FaceBook, and other social networking sites where people can communicate to one another through personalized profiles and comment, blog, and rate each others own pictures brought about a social revolution. People became addicted to these sites, and soon enough criminals began to notice and try and exploit the general public’s naivete regarding Internet safety. Through the wonderful power of deceit the Internet provides, these ingenious crooks posed as friends of some people, and lured them into the real world to steal, abduct, etc. The more sophisticated criminals even earned themselves a special title of reverence: a hacker. These hackers manipulated computer infrastructure and security systems to go right into people’s documents or bank accounts and take whatever they want.

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Everyone knows that our world has become digital.  Many of us earn incomes from working on the internet, manage bank accounts and even pay our bills online.  People who were once afraid of computers are now discovering how to use them because they are so integral to our lives. Unfortunately, the opportunists are out there ready to snap up unguarded personal information at a moment’s notice.  What they do with this information can make a Nightmare on Elm Street seem like a walk in the park.  You have to be very careful about the information you leave behind when you’re on the internet.

Here are a few protective measures you can take to protect your privacy online.

1. Teach your children that it is dangerous to put personal information on the internet.  Home addresses, phone numbers and social security numbers are some of the very personal information uninformed children my give out that can result in identity theft.  It is very important to explain to your children the dangers of giving out information on the web and set boundaries.

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