PurposeThis paper aims to investigate behavioural changes related to self-censorship (SC) in social networking sites (SNSs) as new methods of online surveillance are introduced. In particular, it examines the relationships between SC and four related factors: privacy concerns (PC), privacy awareness (PA), perceived vulnerability (PV) and information management (IM).Design/methodology/approachA national wide survey was conducted in the UK (N= 519). The data were analysed to present both descriptive and inferential statistical findings.FindingsThe level of online SC increases as the level of privacy (...) concern increases. The level of privacy concern increases as the levels of PA and PV increase and the level of effective IM decreases.Originality/valueThis study extends the literature on online SC, showing that PCs increase the level of SC in SNSs. It provides support for three antecedent factors to PC which impact upon levels of SC when communicating in SNSs. (shrink)

The Web 2.0, with online social technologies such as social networking services, blogs, wikis, or microbloging, has brought the vision of the Internet as a social landscape in which people are engaged in a multitude of social activities. This editorial of the special issue ‘Social Web and Identity’ discusses the importance of identity in the context of the Social Web, introducing the different papers of this special issue and the different aspects associated to these online identities. The topics covered in (...) this issue include how people define their identity in blogs and what is the articulation between online and offline identities in these systems. It also presents an article studying the privacy issues in online social networks and more specifically how these risks are perceived and how people can control their identity in this context. The next article compares privacy in two different categories of social systems (social network and collaborative workspace). Finally, another article discusses to what extent the current legislation, such the data protection regulations directive 95/46/EC, is providing the right instrument for dealing with privacy issues. (shrink)

Purpose The popularity of Facebook photo sharing has not only seen a surge in the number of photos shared but also has raised various issues concerning user privacy and self-disclosure. Recent literature has documented the increasing interest of the research community in understanding various privacy issues concerning self-disclosures on Facebook. However, little is known about how different privacy issues, trust and activity influence users’ intentions to share photos on Facebook. To bridge this gap, a research model was developed and tested (...) to better understand the impact of privacy concerns, privacy awareness and privacy-seeking on trust and actual photo sharing activity and subsequently on photo sharing intentions. This study aims to examine the consequences of various facets of privacy associated with photo sharing activity on Facebook. Design/methodology/approach A cross-sectional data from 378 respondents were collected and analysed using partial least squares modelling. Findings The results revealed a significant relationship between various aspects of privacy, including awareness and protective behaviour, with trust and activity. Furthermore, trust and users’ photo sharing activity significantly impact photo sharing intentions on Facebook. Originality/value This study contributes new knowledge concerning various privacy issues and their impact on photo sharing activity and trust. The study also proposes implications that are highly relevant for social networking sites, media agencies and organisations involved in safeguarding the privacy of online users. (shrink)

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between a firm’s strategy and consumers’ decisions in the presence of the paradox of choice and sharing personal information. The paradox of choice implies that having too many choices does not necessarily ensure happiness and sometimes having less is more. A new model is constructed introducing a factor of information sharing into the model of a previous study that embedded the paradox of choice only (Kinjo and Ebina in AI Soc (...) 30(2):291–297, 2015). A key feature of the model is its disutility function. It is demonstrated that if the sign of the cross derivative of the function is positive (negative) at the optimum, there is a positive (negative) correlation between the degree of sharing personal information chosen by the consumers and the number of products offered by the firm in its recommendation systems. It is also numerically indicated that the profit function of the firm becomes convex or concave depending on the shape of the disutility function. These results suggest that firms should carefully investigate the shape of the disutility function, under the paradox of choice and sharing personal information. (shrink)