Privacy is So Last Year

Posted on September 14, 2013 Updated on October 7, 2013

Think about your social media interactions throughout the day.

You might wake up and post a few pictures from last night to Instagram to start the morning off right. Maybe eat some breakfast and scroll through Facebook, commenting on statuses and posting your own. Then you head to class and tweet about how much of a drag school is and that you’re looking forward to partying this weekend. During lunch you pin some boards to your Pinterest and re-post a few blogs from Tumblr. After you get home from school, you post a hilarious video of you doing the Wobble at your friend’s house. All in a day’s work, right?

Now tomorrow, the guy in charge of the interview process at your dream job does a Google search on your name, just to see what’s out there. He finds all your social media posts from yesterday, and the day before, and the month before and a year ago. That brings me to a very important question that we all need to ask:

Would you hire your cyber self?

It’s hard for us to comprehend that our fun posts on social media sites could come back and haunt us.

You are an extension of where you work and according to many employers, that applies to your virtual, social media-loving self as well. More and more, employers are turning to the Internet as an addition to a potential employee’s resumé. Not only can executives find information on you, but so can someone in California, China, or right next door. Never has it been harder to be unknown than now. Only those completely off of social media have a chance of having information privacy, and even then, you can’t control if others put pictures or information about you on the Web.

Moral of the story: No one is safe. Except for the hardcore hermits. We have a digital footprint. Many children who can’t even talk have a digital footprint. Now that’s a whole other blog post we’ll have to save for some other time.

It’s also interesting to think that our Internet info could be available to anyone forever. The Internet’s lack of privacy is frightening in many, many ways, but it could also immortalize people in ways they couldn’t achieve without the World Wide Web. Which could be exciting or equally as scary.

 

(Image retrieved from http://www.pr-squared.com/index.php/2012/06/if-facebook-is-forever)

Post with the thought that your content could live on forever.

Because along with YOLO, Gangnam Style, and KONY 2012, privacy is so last year.