Tips for Protecting Your Privacy

Are you the type of person who has several deadbolts on your front door and an alarm or do you prefer to use just a simple lock and key to protect your home? Well, your comfort level with security in your life is probably based on many things such as location, feeling of personal safety, and how you present yourself. The same is true for your online life as well. 

Your connections with others are now more visible and transparent online. People are often questioning where the boundaries are and how do they protect their privacy online, so, here are a few pointers. 

To set up an alarm for your online life, use Google Alerts so you will be notified when you are mentioned online. 

Facebook:
+Designate categories for your friends such as “Family,” “Professional,” “College,” “Richmond,” “High School,” and “Online only”
+Set your privacy settings to determine which categories are able to see specific information. Privacy settings can be found by hovering over “Settings” in the top right corner of your Facebook page

Twitter:
+Set up multiple accounts—1 for personal and 1 for your business
+Set your account to “Private” if you don’t want your tweets to appear in the public stream

There are many other sites and each one has some type of privacy setting that you can control. Take some time to learn what options you have and think about how you are using the platform. Lastly, use common sense. Don’t put content out that you are concerned may reflect poorly on you. Jolie O’Dell was on the Tweet That! Panel for Social Media Club Education Connection this week and she said it best, “Be the best YOU that you can be online.”