Social Media Security



Do you recognize the image to the right? Odds are probably not. Well, this woman, the one in a wedding dress trying to find a ride was Giuseppina Pasqualino di Marineo, also known as Bacca. Bacca, along with her friend Silvia Moro developed an idea in order to put “faith in people’s basic trustworthiness.” (Shirky, pg. 167) Unfortunately for Bacca the experimental art project ended in tragedy. Through their travels Bacca and Silvia split up and shortly after Bacca went missing. According to authorities a man by the name of Murat Karataş picked Bacca up from a gas station where he then raped and killed her.Bacca Wiki

What went wrong? Should we not trust others? Trust is a human trait so we all use it in some way, but the security within it is there to aid us in our decisions.

Connections such as PickupPal.com, a site that networks one another in order to find a ride to work, the mall, etc; it’s a modern form of carpooling. PickupPal.com The difference here remains perhaps within the references that PickUpPal.com provides. Bacca and Silvia trusted that the public as a whole would do no wrong to a perceived “innocent” women. Their travels proved otherwise. PickupPal.com includes references of its transportation, reviews from multiple people writing in reviews with an underlying message of “you can trust them”. Bacca made the first mistake that a random man at a nearby gas station has only pure intentions.

We must be careful, and unfortunately more so for women than men. I predict that if this type of experiment had been tested by two men, say in their thirties, perhaps it would of had a better ending. Social media today is so open, so easy to share with the entire world your every day schedule just by hitting the enter key. But the true question is: should you? Facebook and Twitter sites have increased our capabilities to interact with others around the world in an instant and each year it seems younger generations have access in doing so. How many more Dateline Stories must be aired before teens and parents responsible are educated in online safety? The way our world appears to work is that something bad has to occur before a lesson is learned, so, let’s educate ourselves now before we end up in tomorrow’s headlines.