Social Media Influence on Personal Security among the Youth in Nairobi City County, Kenya

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Date
2022
Authors
SALLY, SOITA NAFULA
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Abstract
Use of social media has become a very important aspect of modern life. Growing use of social media has been associated with positive and negative outcomes such as considerable personal security risks. This study examined social media influence on personal security among youth in Nairobi County. The objectives of the study were to determine the forms of social media, crimes, to examine crimes that result from social media use among the youths to analyse the influence of social media on personal security and to identify challenges facing the prosecution of social media crimes to identify challenges facing law enforcement in investigating, prosecuting and preventing social media crimes in relation to personal security among the youths in Nairobi County. The study was guided by victim precipitation theory and space transition theory. The target population were members of Professional Criminologists Association of Kenya, PCAK. Purposive sampling was used to select 155 youth respondents from a population of 15000 youths and 145 law enforcement interviewees drawn from 2,000 law enforcement officers in PCAK in Nairobi County. Piloting of questionnaire were disseminated among 30 PCAK youths Nakuru chapter. The research instruments were verified by the supervisor for content validity. Statistical Packages for Social Sciences, SPSS software was used in data entry and descriptive statistics was used to analyse the data. Qualitative data was analyzed using content analysis, coding, classification and text inferencing. This study was significant to academic research, criminal justice practitioners and the private sector to assist in goal formulation and achievement of cyber security. Results of this research showed that forms of social media that youth mostly prefer is WhatsApp over other social media platforms. The most preferred social media platforms by both gender was found to be WhatsApp and Twitter. The findings of this research showed that about 84% of youth respondents in Nairobi City County had opinion that Facebook was most insecure. Further, about 52% of the youth respondents confirmed that they had been victims. Tracking offenders , lack of technological capacity and legal challenges. It was recommended that future research can focus on the issue of spatial dispersion of social media security influences on in Nairobi City County. Such dispersions should be based on real social media crime incidences by type time and location to give insights on how policing can be enhanced in response to such dispersion and temporal diffusion of such crimes especially on mobile platforms
Description
A Research Project Submitted In Partial Fulfilment For The Award Of Degree Of Master Of Arts In Security Management And Police Studies In The School Of Security, Diplomacy And Peace Studies Of Kenyatta University
Keywords
Peace Studies, Police Studies, Security and Diplomacy
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