Information Bubbles

I really have no idea of what an information bubble is. I guess it is something related to information a regular surfer can't access. I've never heard this term in my entire life.

I want to learn...

• What are information bubbles?
• How do they work? How are they created?
• Can they harm me or my computer?
• Who uses them? For what purpose?

The links I use...

http://www.thefilterbubble.com/ted-talk

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-an-information-bubble.htm

What I learned...

• Information bubbles are also called information filters.
• Basically, your information bubble is how a certain website uses your searching history to alter and personalize what you see.
• Common websites like Google, Yahoo and Facebook are using information bubbles.
• Even if two people search for the same topic, their results might be altered.
• Some factors that might alter your information bubble are: location, search history, what you first click, etc.
• Even if you are not logged on, these pages can alter your results.
• Internet today is not as standard as it was before. 
• Algorithmic are the ones that alter your bubble.    

I think that this topic is very relevant to everyone. Today, we depend on the internet and not many people know that any time you Google something, you can get a different result than what a person on the other side of the world could. I personally didn't know this happened. Today, I learned that the information I get is bias and that my results are altered. It makes me wonder how accurate my results are now.

One question I still have is the security issues that information bubbles bring. How do you know that these websites can't use your history to harm you? How do you know that all of what you search is not a lie?