Online Social Networks: Threats and Solutions

TL;DR

This paper reviews security and privacy threats in online social networks, especially for children, and discusses existing solutions and recommendations to enhance user protection and privacy.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive review of threats, evaluates current solutions, and offers practical recommendations and future research directions for OSN security.

Findings

Users often expose personal data leading to privacy risks

Existing solutions can improve security but are not universally adopted

Recommendations can help users protect their privacy effectively

Abstract

Many online social network (OSN) users are unaware of the numerous security risks that exist in these networks, including privacy violations, identity theft, and sexual harassment, just to name a few. According to recent studies, OSN users readily expose personal and private details about themselves, such as relationship status, date of birth, school name, email address, phone number, and even home address. This information, if put into the wrong hands, can be used to harm users both in the virtual world and in the real world. These risks become even more severe when the users are children. In this paper we present a thorough review of the different security and privacy risks which threaten the well-being of OSN users in general, and children in particular. In addition, we present an overview of existing solutions that can provide better protection, security, and privacy for OSN users. We also offer simple-to-implement recommendations for OSN users which can improve their security and privacy when using these platforms. Furthermore, we suggest future research directions.