The internet has been a blessing to humanity. It has made life easy and helped technology improve. We cant imagine living without e-mails apand video calls and not to forget Facebook! Its really amazing how much we rely on Google to search information. School work, research, study material and what not can be found on the internet. But with the advantages of the internet, come its disadvantages too. No invention of man can be perfect. Though the advantages of using the internet are numerous, we cannot afford to ignore the disadvantages.
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10. **E-Mail spamming**
When we talk about electronic spam, we are talking about electronic junk mail or junk newsgroup postings. The fact that an e-mail is classified as spam is on the following two basic criteria. A) It is unwanted.
This is the deciding factor. These emails are sent in large quantities to numerous recipients. A major negative effect of electronic spam is that it uses up a lot of network bandwidth. Moreover, it may include malware in the form of scripts or other executable attachments. On viewing such e-mails or downloading the attachments, you might unknowingly invite viruses to enter into your system and harm it...
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9. **The well of Negativity**
Yes. The internet offers you everything you can possibly think of searching. If it provides you information you need for your school project, it also provides you information that will have a negative influence on you. Pornography, videos related to violent crimes, terrorism, documentaries on serial killers, etc. etc. If you are surfing the net, you are most likely to stumble across negative information. The fact that it is so easy to find ways of committing suicide is just astonishing.
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8. **Pranksters**
Internet is also a haven for pranksters. Recently, flipkart which is the largest e-commerce company in India, decided to stop delivering consignments which value greater than ten thousand rupees to consumers in Uttar Pradesh as there have been cases where people order expensive products on a Cash on Delivery basis and then refuse to accept the order. In such cases, the company and the sellers associated with company suffer huge losses. It is really easy to play such pranks without being caught. One only needs to go to an internet cafe, visit the site, order an expensive product on your neighbours address (so that you can watch the look on his face when the order is delivered) and then just walk out of the cafe as any normal person would do.
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7. **Time Wastage**
Time waits for none. We tend to forget this fact. It happens with almost all of us. You need to use the web urgently because you need to complete a task and the internet is irrefutably the fastest way to find what you are looking for. You connect your laptop to the web all the while thinking about your task and what you need to do. As soon as the home page opens on your computer screen, an advertisement of an online shopping site pops up. You are tempted to visit the site but you stop for a moment, thinking about the task at hand but then you visit the site anyway. After all, just looking at the site wont do any harm. Before you know it, you are looking at items one after the other as minutes fly by. Online games, social networking sites, online shopping sites, chat rooms, etc. the list is endless. For a person who is looking to eliminate boredom, internet is the best thing he can come across!
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6. **Hacking**
My facebook account just got hacked! No. Maybe your password wasnt strong enough. Maybe you gave it once to your best friend and forgot to change. Maybe you forgot to logout while leaving the internet cafe. Your fault. I walk in next to login to my facebook and your account pops up. Yes, I am bad. I hacked it. Exposing the weakness of a system is bad. Downloading your favourite movie just because its available for free is a crime. I wont mention about the government leaks. It would be too much to talk about for a common man. A hacker is not a cracker! is the first thing I say when a not so geeky person asks me what hacking is. At the same time words of my middle school computer teacher echo in my brain- Breaking in your own house because you lost the keys is not a crime!
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5. **Posting fake advertisements**
Internet is the easiest way to reach out to the people. Some people use this to fulfill their own evil intentions. You might be looking for online jobs which provide you the opportunity to work from home and make some extra bucks. You stumble across an advertisement that looks too good to say no to. You contact the advertiser little knowing that you are stumbling into a trap. The advertiser asks for your bank account details and you being na0Š7ve, give him all the details hoping for an advance payment. The dangers of looking for such offers online is the possibility of them being fake and even worse, posted by cyber felons.
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4. **Cyber Bullying**
Another misuse of the internet is cyber bullying. People make fake profiles on social networking sites and email ids so that they can anonymously threaten a person. Victims of cyber bullying face psychological issues that interfere with their daily routine and work. In most of the cases victims are plagued with lower self-esteem and increased suicidal tendencies. In 2011, the NCPC (National Crime Prevention Council) reported that almost half of the teens in the United States of America are affected by the perils of cyber bullying. The fact that it is online, makes it even more dangerous because the bully does not need to be physically present in front of his victim. Cyber bullying can take place any time.
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3. **Piracy**
Piracy is the act of illegally copying or downloading copyrighted material. People commit piracy because it saves money at their end. However, the loss suffered by the owners is neglected. Its their piece of creation and they deserve to be rewarded for it. Stating more emotionally, you just cant snatch away someones bread and butter! One credible analysis by the Institute for Policy Innovation concluded that, every year, global music piracy causes $12.5 billion in economic losses, 71,060 U.S. job losses and a loss of $2.7 billion in workers income. This is indeed a huge loss! For all those supporters of piracy who think that piracy is victim less, the data clearly illustrates the loss suffered by its victims.
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2. **Identity Theft**
Yes! Internet steals your ID. First, our information is more easily accessible to the criminals through the malware softwares we all fall victims of. Second and more importantly, whatever we put up on social media websites is accessible to a lot of people. You have an account on orkut/facebook/twitter/Google / any other social website? If yes, can you guarantee that you are well acquainted with all people in your friend list and that none of them has a fake account? NO! You Cant. And the result is a disaster of which a lot of people have been a victim. Not only is the identity stolen but also the pictures are cropped and used in unabashed places, porn sites, brazen ads are just to name a few. BEWARE!
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1. **Porn**
Quite undoubtedly, porn is the one of the most popular misuse of internet. The internet has made it extremely easy for people to have access to pornography. When minors are exposed to pornography, it always has a negative effect. They are not mature enough to understand about the moral aspects of sexual intercourse and watching porn creates a wrong perception about coitus in their impressionable minds. Common problems that arise are chronic masturbation, inability to have emotionally healthy relationships, psychological troubles and porn addiction. What people fail to understand is that pornography is a business and the actors performing sexual acts do not necessarily enjoy the acts but its the money that pushes them towards doing such stuff.
