How might my digital footprint affect my future opportunities? Well for one, if I posted something inappropriate and then went to apply for a job, the company I applied to could do a background check on my digital footprint and decide that they don’t want someone who posts things like that to be on their staff team. Therefore, I ruin my reputation and any chance at getting a decent job. Also, my friends and family don’t want to see those kinds of photos and comments so if I did post something like that then I could ruin my relationships with those important people.

Online, people can see everything you do, whether it’s making a rude comment on someone else’s post or posting something inappropriate yourself. Once you make that mistake that’s what people are going to see when they look at you, and I can’t speak for everyone else, but I sure don’t want to be seen as something other than I truly am. A few strategies that you can use to keep your digital footprint appropriate and safe are; simply just asking yourself, would you be ok with the entire world seeing this? How would your family react to seeing this? Another is to use the privacy settings on each site you use, you should also keep passwords on all your devices to prevent others from braking in and exploiting personal content.

Some of the information I learned was that you could quite literally google somebody and pretty much anything they put on the internet would come up. Also, that even if you think your accounts are private, the things you post can still get out into the world in one way or another. If a friend posted something that wasn’t appropriate then I would tell them straight up, but also go about it in a calm and rational way. I also wouldn’t be on their back about the subject, I would tell them once an if they choose to ignore my advice then that is their choice. I know I can make good choices and I know I did my job to alert my peers when they have made a decision that could hurt them in the future.