Advantages and Disadvantages of Internet

In the history of mankind, the Internet is the greatest development in the domain of communication industry. Similar to each and every invention, the Internet carries a number of advantages and disadvantages. Nevertheless, the advantages of the Internet are so huge in number that they outperform the disadvantages quite easily.

What is Internet?
According to the definition provided by Oxford dictionary, the Internet is an arrangement of connected computers, which lets the computer users all over the globe exchange data. At the present time, approximately 33% of the world population has accessibility to the Internet. The Internet is an extraordinary entertainment and learning tool that may be utilized in a number of modes to increase the ability of a user to collect information. The principal components of the Internet are the World Wide Web (WWW) and e-mail. With the passage of time, the Internet has become the most effective business tool in the contemporary world. It can be described as a global meeting place where people from every corner of the world can come simultaneously.

Advantages

1) Information The biggest benefit offered by the Internet is information. It functions as a valuable resource of information. You can find any type of information on any subject with the help of the search engines like Yahoo and Google.
2) Communication The primary goal of the Internet is communication. It has done extremely well in this field, however the development process is still going on to make it more dependable and quick. By sending an e-mail, we can contact a person who is physically present thousand miles away within the fraction of a second’s time.
3) Entertainment Internet functions as a popular medium of entertainment. A wide variety of entertainment including video games, music, movies, chat room, news and others can be accessed through the Internet.
4) E-commerce E-commerce is the idea that is implemented for any form of commercial strategy or business transactions that entails transmission of data from one corner of the world to another. E-commerce has become a fantastic option through which you can shop anything.
5) Formation of communities Internet helps in formation of communities or forums. Here a number of people can participate in different types of debates and discussions, express their views and gather valuable knowledge.
6) Services A variety of services are offered via Internet, for example job searching, online banking, buying movie tickets, hotel reservations and consultation services etc. When you avail these services offline, they become more expensive.

Disadvantages

1) Spamming: Spamming denotes distribution of unsolicited e-mails in large numbers. They are meaningless and they unnecessarily block the whole system. These activities are treated as illegal.
2) Theft of personal details While using the Internet, there is high probability that your personal details like name, address and credit card number may be accessed by con artists and used for fraudulent purposes.
3) Pornography: Pornography is definitely harmful for your children. There are numerous pornographic sites available over the Internet and watching any of those can have very bad influence on the mental health of your children.
4) Virus threat Virus is a program that interrupts the usual operation of your personal computer system. PCs linked to the Internet have high probability of virus attacks and as a result of this your hard disk can crash, giving you a lot of trouble.