Social and privacy threats in social networks, challenges and the most critical issues

Online social networks are permeating every aspect of our daily lives. With their incomparable popularity, social networks have evolved from platforms for news distribution and communication and social interaction to essential tools for online content distribution, professional networking, social recommendations, marketing, and more. Due to their heterogeneous nature and complexity, there are many technical and social challenges that need to be addressed. Specifically, security and privacy are among the most critical issues in online social networks. This paper identifies the characteristic features of social networks and the impact they have on their users. The main objective is to contribute to the discussion about privacy and security by identifying potential threats and challenges in this dimension of cyberspace