Dangers of social media

Most people in 2021 use social media. Facebook has 2.91 billion active users this year and Instagram has
1.38 billion users. We can tell that these platforms are widely spread, but can we tell who is behind
some of the active profiles.

Social media are a good thing to communicate with our family and friends every day, to share some of
our favorite pictures and videos. But what happens when an unknown person wants to follow our
account?

The internet has its good sides, and bad ones as well. Some people enjoy accessing dating sites and
messaging strangers and in the end meeting up with them. This can be real fun, but it also can be very
dangerous. Some couples met over these sites and even got married in the end. The study shows that
even 60% of experiences are positive. But what happened with the other 40%?

It is not only about dating sites. Let's look at Instagram for example. It has 1.38 billion users, and
probably half of them are not even real people. Fake accounts exist, they are easy to make, and they are
usually used by criminals. They stole someone's photos, come up with a fake name and use these
profiles to find out where we live, who our parents are, where we go to school, etc. But why do they
need these pieces of information? The answer is obvious: to follow us, break into our house, steal our
properties, and maybe even kill us.

Social media is usually fun, but only if we use it safely. We have to be aware of the risk of letting
strangers follow us. There is an option to make our accounts private so that if someone wants to follow
us, they would need our permission. Otherwise, we should block shady accounts to completely stop
them from approaching us ever again.