The Harmful Effects of the Internet
By: Rachel Platt
Would you just put anything on the internet? The internet was first developed in the late 50’s and 60’s. It was used as a way of communication and sending data to the military. It was never intended to be abused by the common person. Many things can be harmful on the World Wide Web. Changes of identity theft, hackers, and inaccurate information.
The first thing, harmful and unsafe about the internet is identity theft. When shopping on the internet or banking people can still your identity. As many as 10 million people a year are effect by it. People who shop or bank on the internet have suffered the effects of identity theft. There is no warning to aware you that you have had your identity stolen. There are clues that will appear that will be able to tell you if you have had it stolen. Identity is most likely to happen to the most random person. One way to tell if you have had your identity stolen is if your credit card statements are not coming through and some of the mail is missing. Next is if your statements are coming in that you see charges that are for something that you yourself would never buy. For example if you have a charge for a flat screen TV. The final way to know is that a collection agency tells you that your collecting money in this account that you have never opened.
The next, dangers thing on the internet is the hacker. A hacker is a person who illegally gains access to and sometimes tampers with information in a computer system. Now that we know what a hacker is lets look at what they hack. Hackers can take anything from you. They hack into things like stealing a DVD from someone. They even do it because they think it’s cool. Hackers are a like a gang. Hackers can steal your bank a count, your information; they can put viruses on your computer. Most hackers like to hack in to the government computers. They do it because they want to be cool, but there is nothing cool about been a hacker.
The last thing, that is harmful about the internet, is that there are many different types of inaccurate information. So many people can put what ever they want to on the internet. When you are looking for information that you need to use in a research paper you should be using websites that are educational. For example, .org, .net, .gov. The one site that is the king of all false information is Wikipedia. It’s the place that anyone can put what ever they want to. This is why you should be extra careful of what you read on the internet.
On the other hand, many people would disagree with me and say that the internet is the most awesome invitation ever invited. The internet is used everyday by everybody. People might think that everything is true and it’s ok to do certain things on it. This point of view is wrong because as I said earlier in all my arguments that the internet is the most unsafe place in the whole cyber space world. I think that my idea is the correct one.
Still think the internet is safe? Well if I didn’t get you to change your mind I hope that nothing happens to you. Identity theft, hackers, and inaccurate information are only a few things that can happen on the internet. Take your changes but take it from me don’t believe everything you read and be safe.
