Communication, digitalization, and surveillance...

Access to the internet, the duration of internet usage, and especially the place of social media in our daily lives are constantly increasing. Mobile communication devices, which are constantly developing and updating within the scope of new communication technologies, have now shrunk enough to fit into everyone's pocket, and with these technologies, it is possible to open up to the world via popular social networks and be reachable from every corner of the globe. As the virtual environment grows day by day, the traces of data transferred to the digital medium are also multiplying.

In these times, also characterized as an "information society," surveillance practices have taken on a structure parallel to the possibilities of high technology. Manuel Castells explains this structure with the concept of the "Network Society."

Individuals come together largely through social media, computers, the internet, smartphones, and tablets rather than by being physically side-by-side.

People who would otherwise find it difficult to communicate with each other in daily life are brought closer through social networks.

With this process we have briefly mentioned, changes are also observed in people's orientations, choices, and certain norms and understandings of privacy. The desire to be seen and perceived has taken precedence over making a wish or a demand visible.

The age of communication we are in also allows for the tracking and accessibility of all kinds of information regarding the expression of our feelings and behaviors, at any moment and in any form.

This process, in which individuals volunteer to be visible within the global network through new communication technologies, brings with it various positive and negative effects.

Information represents 'power.' Every ruling authority needs power for its continuity. Propaganda and surveillance are quite important in terms of power. Social media, which emerged as an alternative following the advanced transformations in internet and information technologies, also draws attention as an effective power.

In conclusion; social media reshapes the produced information in terms of form and content, transforming it into a function that almost hypnotizes large masses by making the dominance of those in power sustainable...

References:

-David Lyon, Surveillance Studies: An Overview, Polity Press, 2007.

-Jeremy Bentham, The Panopticon Writings, Verso, 1995.

-Manuel Castells, The Rise of the Network Society, Wiley-Blackwell, 2010.

-Uğur Dolgun, Şeffaf Hapishane Yahut Gözetim Toplumu: Küreselleşen Dünyada Gözetim, Toplumsal Denetim ve İktidar İlişkileri, Ötüken Neşriyat, 2008.

-Zygmunt Bauman, David Lyon, Liquid Surveillance, Polity Press, 2013.