Social Networking Safety Tips

I was a participant in a Social Media workshop this past week. It is amazing to stop and realize that the internet is the world's largest information exchange. And although it has many positive aspects from a business expanding its customer base, to individuals communicating instantly to friends and family, there are a number of issues that should be carefully thought out. Especially when considering the safety of children on these sites.

Facebook, Twitter, MySpace... there are numerous sites to choose from. Everyone needs to think about what is being posted. For example:

• Avoid posting your birthday or your home address in your profile.
• Don't use names or birthdays as passwords. Instead, choose a combination of upper and lower case letters, numbers and symbols. Have different passwords for every site.
  
• Do not assist stalkers by telling them where you work, go to school or hang out.
• Do not announce to thieves that your house is not occupied because you are on vacation.
• Do not post photos that would be incriminating.
• Be respectful, ask permission before posting anything about someone other than yourself.

This is the information age. Nothing is sacred anymore. Anyone can find out who you are by doing a search. This includes the police; colleges you are applying for; jobs you are apply for; and of course identity thieves.
There is physical you, and then there is Digital You. It is extremely difficult to prove if information found on the internet about you is fact or fiction. This could be detrimental to the real you.

There is an awesome Federal Government site which I highly recommend visiting:
www.OnGuardOnLine.gov
This site provides tips to help guard against Internet fraud. Topics range from on-line shopping to Social Networking and your on-line health. There are videos and interactive games to test your cyber smarts. Parents should go through this site with their children, and employers should encourage their employees to improve their knowledge regarding fraudulent, deceptive and unfair business practices in the marketplace.

Final note - July 28, 2008, Facebook accidentally publicly revealed personal information about its members, which could be useful to identity thieves. The full dates of birth of many of Facebook's 80 million active users were visible to others, even if the individual member had requested that the information remained confidential.
I'm not personally concerned about this because I had entered a false birthday in my profile!