Online Identity is defined as an online persona or social identity that is established through the internet. Most of us have an online identity whether it be through social media (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc.) or something as simple as an email address--we all have one. Most people use their online identity in a harmless way as an extended means of communicating with friends and loved ones, but as I found in an article from Wired, "The Online Identity Crisis," not everyone uses their online identity for good (including the owners of the sites).
The article discusses a little bit about the prevalence of identities being stolen through online means and the issues that come with anonymous social media (Whisper, Yik Yak, Secret, etc.) and anonymity in general. It brought up a good point that in "real life" there is really no reason for anonymity unless you are committing some sort of criminal act which is very true, and some real problems can arise from anonymity. For example, last semester the idiot that posted a threat to Penn State via Yik-Yak. Whether or not the kid was serious about the threat or not it caused quite an uproar over campus because no one knew who posted it. Luckily the poster was not very intelligent and the authorities were able to track him down and make sure nothing bad happened, but that may not always be the case.
Identity theft has been a huge problem for a long time whether it be stealing someone's identity and opening credit cards in their name or creating a fake profile of someone else, it's definitely a problem. To me, it's always been kind of a scary thought meeting people through an online source because you never really know who the person is. Someone who appears to be a teenage girl online could really be middle aged man in real life.
The other subject that was discussed in this article is the issue of social media sites taking the things you may search for or "like" and creating their own online identity of you. The example used in the article was a man who had health problems and loved classic cars. The man may or may not want the people he associates with in the classic car realm to know that he has health problems but if he were to search about some sort of health issue, social media sites can post ads relevant to that wherever they want--therefore disallowing him to keep parts of his identity private. I recall many times that I was on Facebook and noticed the ads on the sides and being like, "How do they know I like that?" It's a weird thing to know that nothing you do online is truly private. So the question remains, should sites be allowed to use the things you have searched for their own monetary benefit? I don't think so. It's freaky when I buy a pair of pants online and then ten minutes later I see ads for those same pair of pants all over my Facebook, like what? Banana Republic has nothing to do with my Facebook but that ad still shows up there? Weird.
The last thing I found pretty interesting in this article is the huge push for people to sign in online with one ID. Google has already pretty much done that, I mean that's how I signed into blogger. At first glance that sounds awesome, one identity means only one username and password to remember, but that could be detrimental. If we sign into everything with one singular ID all of our media sites will have access to the things we do, and that may not be a good thing.
http://www.wired.com/2014/11/the-online-identity-crisis/
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