 When considered through the lens of the regulatory definition of “private information”, social media postings are often considered public, especially when users take no visible, affirmative steps to restrict access. As a result, big data researchers might conclude subjects are not deserving of particular privacy consideration. Yet, the social media platforms frequently used for big data research purposes represent a complex environment of socio-technical interactions, where users often fail to understand fully how their social activities might be regularly monitored, harvested, and shared with third parties, where privacy policies and terms of service are not fully understood and change frequently, and where the technical infrastructures and interfaces are designed to make restricting information flows and protecting one’s privacy difficult.