2017 prediction 8 – users continue to expose themselves to the perils of social media

Figure 8 – the success of social media

Source: ITCandor, 2017

There’s no question that the Internet has become a major part of everyday life, creating huge revenues for pioneering vendors (see Figure 8 for the evolution of the total revenues of the major suppliers). Despite the numerous successes of hackers, identity thieves, spammers, Wikileaks and others, consumers continue to embrace an ever-increasing involvement. The majority of users are either ignorant or unconcerned about the potential dangers of Internet usage. Making life easier and more fun seems to be more important than the obvious perils of using these immature systems – many of which are owned by foreign companies operating outside the laws and regulations of their own country.

My eighth prediction is that Internet usage will continue to expand despite major failures to protect business, customer and citizen data in 2017. Despite the renewed nationalism shown in the election of Donald Trump to US president and the UK’s Brexit from the EU and new legislation such as the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (due to become law in May 2018), it’s highly unlikely that the global nature of the Internet will come to an end any time soon.

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