The Internet has become a major source of information for many people. However, online information has usually not gone through the same checks as newspaper articles, books or factual television programming. There is a higher risk that some of the facts or quotations from a particular source in an article are false. Whereas newspapers might lose customers if people find out they have been ‘selling lies’, a blog and other online content can be easily created and uploaded as well as just as quickly being deleted. If people base their opinions on the information they find online, they could well be basing their opinion on false information

Everyone’s privacy can be greatly harmed by the Internet. Some websites store information. Some ask us to fill in information which can be sold to other sites for commercial purposes. As the Internet gains more and more users the temptation for criminals to gain our private information becomes greater. Hackers can hide their true location when engaging in illegal activities online, so the likelihood of their being brought to justice is low. Whenever people post something online, it becomes almost impossible to erase, and with the proliferation of social networks posting personal information online is becoming second nature, this is a dangerous precedent. Take for example the posting of our locations online via geotagging, this for many is an action which doesn’t take much consideration, however, to demonstrate the danger of this designer Barry Borsoom setup the website PleaseRobMe.com which would grab geocaching data and tell people when a person’s house was potentially empty

Various reports have linked a sharp rise in paedophilia with the growth of the Internet[2] as it is an easy and often anonymous way to share such material with the world. The ability for anyone to publish anything online could clearly do considerable harm to society, which would have otherwise been much less prevalent and easier to control and regulate.