Threats Against Information Privacy and Security in Social Networks: A Review

This review paper is an attempt to cover the arising threats against information privacy and security in the attractive Social Network environment that represents a rich mine of user personal data. First, the paper discusses the information privacy, while many researches have been found in the relevant literature with respect to privacy in Social Networks, more efforts are needed especially on data leakages that happen to each entity including Social Network users, service providers, third and external parties, and how data linkages can produce useful information to these parties. Second, the paper discusses the information security focusing on the social engineering threats, while many efforts have been found in the relevant literature with respect to social engineering in the Internet in general, only few attempts cover the topic in the Social Network environment. In this paper, threats of fake accounts, identity theft, and spear phishing are discussed specifically in the Social Networks. Furthermore, the paper presents the roles of Social Network users and service providers to protect information privacy and prevent threats against information security. This review paper is an attempt to become a guideline to current information privacy and security threats in Social Network environment, and to pave the way for the researchers to investigate more solutions for these threats in future works.