No, they don't. They soak up tons of your most personal and sensitive information like a sponge, and you don't know what's done with it. In the "good old Internet", that did not happen. Also in the good old Internet, it wasn't the masses all dependent on a few central mega-corporations shaping the interaction, but a many-to-many affair, with people and organizations of different sizes running the sites where interaction took place.
Ok, I know I'm describing the past with rosy glasses. After all, the Internet started as a DARPA project. But still, current reality is itself rather dystopic in many ways.