The rise in the use of social media and related technology has been phenomenal over the last 3-5 years, but despite this I think there is still a lack of education in how to use it and the repercussions it can have in our lives.
The recent hacking of celebrity iCloud accounts is just another example of the dangers that the Internet can hold and how we must try and maintain a good level of security at all times. The other lesson to learn is that once you upload something on your smart-phone or other device you really have no control over it.
When we store data on our smart-phones like, photos documents or messages, unless we change certain settings that data can be automatically uploaded to an associated computer server like, iCloud for Apple. Once on the server we hope that this is the only place they’ll stay, but realistically our info is copied again and again to numerous other servers to be stored for us to be able to access when and where we want. Because our info is copied almost instantly, it means that when we think we’ve deleted something from our device and from the cloud space, it might still be out there somewhere.
In case you’re interested in doing some further reading on this do check out the following articles that have recently been published… It’s pretty amazing what’s possible with just a little bit of money and the ability to follow some fairly simple instructions.
http://computer.howstuffworks.com/cloud-computing/cloud-computing.htm
http://mashable.com/2014/09/04/i-hacked-my-own-icloud-account/
My advice is to check your upload settings and be careful what you choose to store on your device or upload. You just never know where it might end up.
Coaching and media consultancy 