Cybersecurity and privacy in tourism social media: Prioritizing ethical risks with SWARA

The integration of social media into tourism has changed how travelers plan, experience, and share their journeys, creating both opportunities and ethical challenges. This article reports the development and application of an expert-prioritized hierarchy of ethical and security challenges in tourism-related social media. A mixed-methods design was used, combining a systematic literature review, expert interviews, and the Step-wise Weight Assessment Ratio Analysis (SWARA) technique. The SWARA results identified five highest-ranked challenges: violation of individuals’ privacy through the sharing of personal photos and videos, data security and protection on social media platforms, risk of tourists’ information being hacked, possible theft of tourists’ information or passwords, and dissemination of false and misleading tourism information. These findings suggest that the most pressing concerns are both content-related and structural, reflecting weak privacy safeguards, gaps in data protection, cybersecurity vulnerabilities, and unequal platform-user relationships. The interpretation is guided primarily by Information Ethics and supported by Social Exchange Theory. Together, these perspectives explain the moral obligations linked to information use and the power imbalances involved in data-for-access arrangements. Emerging issues, including AI-generated content, are discussed as developments that may intensify misinformation and authenticity concerns. Practical recommendations are provided for platform developers, tourism businesses, and policymakers on privacy controls, cybersecurity safeguards, content verification, and clearer accountability in tourism social media environments.