10 Solid Tips to Safeguard Your Privacy
Written on November 7, 2009 by Kay
How To Use Social Media Responsibly
Remember when USENET was the big social networking hub? If you don’t remember USENET, don’t feel bad. It was before the world knew about the world wide web, and it didn’t have any fancy widgets that you could embed into your profile to stream an mp3 or play Tetris, not like the cool stuff that have nowadays.
Thanks to the social networking phenomena, and services like MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter, it seems like everyone and their grandmother is either posting a tweet or updating their status or extending a friendly poke to one of their online friends. The whole concept of social networking boils down to this: Open information and community, two concepts that are easy to exploit if you’re possessed of a devious mind, and, if unarmed with adequate information, easy to fall prey to. To make the entire social networking affair safer for everyone, let’s go over some basic safety guidelines so that we can all make services like MySpace and Facebook more enjoyable.
Mind What You Share
Be mindful of what you post on your profile and what you share with others, publicly or privately. Think twice before posting that photo of your party escapades in Vegas last weekend, and rethink that blog tirade before making it public and attaching your name to it. Embarrassing things have a nasty way of coming back and haunting you when released on the Internet. All it takes is a Google or Facebook search, and your past can resurface with questionable results. Think of it like a tattoo: It’s hard to undo without significant effort, so do you really want that tat of your girlfriend’s name on your arm?
Also, employers are notorious for Googling, MySpacing, and Facebooking your name to find out what kind of a person you are, to get a feel for a prospective hire. Don’t diminish your chances of success by posting embarrassing things online.
Mind What You Say
Facebook status updates and Twitter Tweets can be typed out from anywhere on a mobile device: In traffic, at the local coffee shop, on the ski lift, even on a good old-fashioned laptop, which is why it’s so easy to say something that you wished you could take back. Remember who your buddies are and who has the potential to read your posts, tweets, updates, or whatever. For example, you don’t want to post a Facebook status update proclaiming that “I’m seriously bored …” during office hours and have your boss read it, landing you in hot water. The last thing you want is to get Facebook Fired.
My Friend’s Friend …
The Internet really has made the world a smaller place. Communication at the speed of light has connected the world. Unfortunately, this can work against you. Here’s an example. Let’s say that you decide to rant about your boss’s spastic way of handling a crisis at work. You check, double check, and triple check that your boss IS NOT in your network, therefore you can post your rant with impunity, right?
Well, this looks good on the surface, but you never know if your boss is in one of your friends’ network, or is in the network of a friend of one of your friends (it can get incredibly complicated.) All it takes is for your friend to comment on your ranting status update, and if your boss is in your friend’s network, the status update that you thought was hidden from your boss now becomes viewable. A good rule of thumb is this: Don’t post anything online that you’re not 100% comfortable with everyone seeing.
Be Wary of Quizzes
Facebook users love to take online quizzes. It’s fun, and if taken with honesty in mind, can say a lot about a person. Unfortunately, quizzes can reveal a little too much information about a person, unbeknownst to them. Most of the social networking quizzes will pop up a permission page, clearly stating that by proceeding you’re giving the quiz application access to your profile information, content, photos, friend’s photos, so on and so forth. Many users don’t take the time to give said permission pages a good look-over. If they did, I think a great deal would opt out of the quiz right off the bat.
