In the U.S., people are guaranteed their right to privacy, but in recent months, this has been an issue due to Facebook.

Facebook has made headlines for its vague privacy policies that allowed users to be tracked offline. A federal investigation revealed what was going on behind the scenes of Facebook. Heather Kelly, with CNN Tech, stated, “According to Facebook, the information it receives can include the name of the website or app, your IP address, your browser, what operating system you use and whether you've visited the third-party site before.” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said during testimony last week that the company collects data about people who have not signed up for Facebook "for security purposes." 

With these revelations, Facebook users are now questioning if they should delete their accounts. This has led to the #DeleteFacebook campaign. SHC sophomore Etienne Favorite said, “I don’t want my personal info being leaked over the internet. Just because I agreed to Facebook’s terms of service doesn’t mean that I would allow it to be used in that sense. The fact that Cambridge [Analytica] was able to procure people's information is a very scary realization about internet safety.”

If users have ever seen an online ad about something they just researched, that’s because social media has given communicators a wealth of information to target consumers. SHC professor and social media expert Stacy Wellborn stated, “Privacy is an ethical issue as well as a legal one. I believe we need to talk more about the ethics of data collection, targeting and our responsibility to handle it respectfully. I’m glad to see the conversation moved beyond professional communicators and into the greater consciousness of our society.”