Social Media – A Boon or A Curse

What this session covered

Presented as a webinar to an international audience, this session considered whether social media is, on balance, a benefit or a hazard. Opening remarks from the institute set the framing: the way social media dissolves geographical and political boundaries, its capacity to spread misinformation and to shape decision-making, its growing presence in schools, and the tension between "policing" the medium and preserving freedom of expression. A moderator then introduced two speakers who addressed the subject in turn, followed by a question-and-answer session and concluding remarks.

The first speaker approached the topic largely from a digital-marketing standpoint. This contribution surveyed harms at the individual level — cyber-bullying, trolling and online harassment, distraction, and the erosion of privacy, including the profiling of users from limited online activity and alleged manipulation around a recent United States presidential election. Two cases in which sustained online abuse was said to have preceded a suicide were cited as illustrations. The same speaker then set out the commercial uses of social media for businesses of varying size, covering brand awareness, audience targeting, lead generation and comparatively low-cost advertising across the major platforms.

The second speaker addressed legal and cyber-security dimensions, characterising social media as a medium whose harms, in that speaker's view, increasingly outweigh its benefits. Points raised included anonymity and common misconceptions about encryption and privacy, the use of platforms as a vehicle for cyber crime — including exploitation of children during lockdown — the circulation of malicious code through routinely forwarded messages, and the risks of reputational damage and litigation. The speaker outlined emerging state responses, including fake-news and cyber-security legislation in several jurisdictions and debates over intermediary liability, and urged user caution, due diligence and restraint in sharing personal material. The subsequent discussion returned to whether social media can be regulated, to practical guidance on business use, and to the implications of proposed cyber-security legislation, with reference made to contemporary Indian cases then attracting intense media attention. Concluding remarks observed that statutory protection of privacy in India remained, in the view expressed, incompletely realised.

Key points raised

• The session was framed around the balance between social media's benefits and its capacity to spread misinformation and cause harm.
• One speaker addressed individual-level harms — cyber-bullying, distraction, loss of privacy and user profiling — alongside the commercial opportunities the platforms offer businesses.
• The other speaker focused on legal and cyber-security concerns, including cyber crime, anonymity, malicious content and reputational risk.
• Emerging regulatory responses were discussed, including fake-news and cyber-security legislation across jurisdictions and questions of intermediary liability.
• The second speaker urged users to treat due diligence and caution as their guiding principle and to limit the personal information they share; the first speaker's privacy message was narrower, holding that deleting one's social media account was, in that speaker's view, the only way to protect one's privacy.
• The discussion touched on contemporary Indian legal matters and named individuals, warranting editorial review before publication.