Pros and Cons of The Internet!

Hey again everyone,

As we know, the internet is a great thing. We can get huge amounts of information within a few clicks of a button. It’s a platform for school students and gamers alike. But everything good comes with a catch, the internet is no exception. The internet can be a tool for criminals, stalkers, scammers and hackers. To have a safe experience online, you need to know how to protect yourself. From using a VPN and/or proxy, to learning how to protect yourself on social media. I will be listing the disadvantages, advantages, and how to have a safe experience online.

Let’s cover the bad news first, while it’s quite uncommon to have anything bad to happen to you, provided you’re being safe and using common sense, it can still happen. You need to make sure you never reveal to much information online, if someone says they’ll buy you something if you give them your account password and such, just think about the situation for a moment. If you give them your password, they have control over your account until you change the password. Even then, they can change the password first, and you may be locked out of your account forever. Trust me, it’s happened to me before. Just don’t do anything stupid, and you should be protected from scammers.

Hackers however, are a different story. Even if you don’t reveal ANY information at all, they may still be able to get into your computer. They can use a password cracker to get into your computer, essentially what it does, is that it goes through every number, symbol and letter until it gets to your password. A good way to protect against this is to use a password encrypter or generator or use two step verification. What THIS does, is change your password every few minutes or hours, making it very difficult for the hacker, what two step verification does is, when someone tries to log in, typically they will have to answer a question like “What was your first pet’s name?” or something along the lines of that.

Next on the line are stalkers and criminals, these two kind of fall into the same category, in fact same with every one of these. But anyway, to protect against stalkers, you essentially have to do the same procedure to protect against scammers, don’t reveal too much information, don’t say anything about your personal life etc. and you should be good to go. However, there are real life stalkers, basically the opposite of internet stalkers. They may find you in real life, THEN find you online, rather than find you online then find you in real life. If this happens, you should immediately notify your parents or the authorities.

Well that covers the bad stuff, now let’s move onto cats riding on unicorns! Of course by this, I mean the positives of the internet. See that word that you have no idea means? Well with a few clicks and copy pastes, you now have an extensive knowledge of said word! The internet can be used a source of entertainment, knowledge and much more.

First off, video games! Whatever your interests are, there’s bound to be a game based on it. Whether your interests are shooters, RPGs, board games, it has everything. Think you’re too “old” for video games? Well get this, there’s a 69-year-old lady who still plays video games. Her favourite game is Skyrim. (My favourite game too.) I’ll link the article at the end if you don’t believe me. Some video games are amazing, the world some developers create are immense and beautiful and are packed with lore and stories. If you believe that you want some fast paced action, try a shooter. If you want to get your brain working, try a platformer or a puzzle game. A good one is Portal, loved those games. Again, anything is possible in a video game.

Moving onto knowledge, despite what teachers say, Wikipedia is great. Sometimes they may not be accurate, but 99% of the information is correct and quite interesting. I actually learned who my ancestor was through Wikipedia. Also, if you’re reading this, you’re using a computer. EduBlogs, Education blogs. Education! The internet is a platform for all, for education, entertainment, everything! But, watch out because some people out there are aren’t afraid of ruining your experience. See ya!

 

69 Year old Gamer: http://www.ksl.com/?nid=333&sid=138536