Covers how social media can expose personal data, spread scams, enable account takeover, and provide channels for influence or abuse.
Search across headline titles and summaries.
Background for this topic.
Social media comprises online services where people and organizations publish content, communicate, and form networks. The term covers public posts, private messages, groups, live streams, advertising systems, and the APIs and third-party applications that process platform data.
For security teams, these platforms expose identity, relationship, and behavioral information that can support targeted phishing, impersonation, or social engineering. Compromised accounts may be used to distribute malicious links or fraud, while excessive sharing and poorly controlled integrations can expose personal or corporate data. Relevant controls include strong authentication, phishing-resistant account recovery, least-privilege access for connected applications, monitoring for brand and executive impersonation, and clear retention and privacy policies. Public posts and platform telemetry can also provide threat intelligence, but collection and use may be constrained by privacy obligations and applicable data-protection rules.
Taiwan's National Security Bureau (NSB) has warned that China-developed applications like RedNote (aka Xiaohongshu), Weibo, TikTok, WeChat, and Baidu Cloud pose security risks due to excessive data collection and data transfer to China
Taiwan warned that popular Chinese-owned apps, including TikTok and Weibo, are harvesting personal data and sending it back to servers in China
In May 2025, the U.S. government sanctioned a Chinese national for operating a cloud provider linked to the majority of virtual currency investment scam websites reported to the FBI. But more than a month later, the accused continues to openly operate accounts at a slew of American tech companies, including Facebook, Github, LinkedIn, PayPal and Twitter/X.
How IT Leaders Can Navigate Regulatory Complexity, Use Tech for Digital SovereigntyFrom Schrems II to TikTok fines, data sovereignty is redefining the rules of digital engagement. It is no longer an option for enterprises. CIOs must navigate a maze of data laws and tech strategies to stay compliant and competitive in a world without digital borders.