Influence of social media on national security

Abstract

The spread and penetration of social media into everyday life are perceived as self-evident and natural phenomena. Generation Z is often identified with mobile technology, which, according to Ozkan & Solmaz [12], they use to interact with each other, maintain social relationships, etc. On the other hand, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. have become the inseparable elements of everyday social contacts for the representatives of previous generations, too. As Conti and Passarella [3] point out, today’s media world is in close contact with the real model of human social behaviour. Such a close interaction between real and virtual worlds that helps solve everyday problems is often seen as a given that makes not only personal but also public life (e.g., e-government [6], business world [7], tourism [11] easier. However, despite these advantages, social media users irresponsibly use personal information, revealing it not only to friends or family members but also to other social network users [14]. Such, at first glance, innocent personal information display creates preconditions for a potential violation of privacy. As Thompson, McGill & Wang [15] point out, personal computer users are among the most vulnerable because of information security threats, as individuals often lack knowledge of technology as well as consequences of its use and have no ability to identify threats. The problem of the research is to see how social media through personal use are related to national security. The object of the research is the impact of social media on national security. The purpose of the research is to reveal the impact of social media on national security.