How to Clear Your Social Media Presence
For $ 100 a year, you can pay for a widget to check your social media accounts for awkward posts that could lower your chances of getting a job or going to college. Startup BrandYourself provides online reputation management software that “minimizes negative search results and builds a positive online presence.”
One feature, in particular, scans past social media posts to flag content related to drug use, alcohol, sex, or negative rhetoric against a former employer. (Scanned images do not include photographs, which can often be more incriminating and approachable.)
If you’re worried about how you will respond to an appointment with a hiring manager or admissions office on social media, then there is a free, albeit more time-consuming, way to make changes: do it yourself.
Search yourself on the Internet
The quickest way to find out what information is available about you is to google it yourself. You can see which photos pop up or something strange appears with the first search result. It’s also a great way to find out if your social media accounts are showing up and, if so, how much information is available to others.
Make social media private
Check your privacy settings on your social media accounts such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. A better setting would be to keep everything on these platforms private, but you can customize this depending on how you use these accounts.
Facebook: For those not added to their account, keep everything private except for the default picture and name. For Friends: Turn on the settings that ask for approval when someone tags you in a post or photo, and only save your photos to a limited number of people. Then check your page to see what you have posted and what others have posted in the past. Even if you didn’t share something terrible, that doesn’t mean that a well-meaning friend didn’t share something as a joke that could be misinterpreted.
Instagram: Consider making your account private. Or browse your feed, look for questionable posts, and temporarily remove the content. Instagram recently released an Archive feature that allows users to retrieve posts from their feed without losing posts, comments, or likes. It can also be returned to the feed whenever you want.
Twitter: Be careful. Are you posting ambiguous and ambiguous tweets? If so, go alone. If not, be vigilant about what you post. Review your old posts and delete tweets (and delete retweets) that your employer or school might consider questionable.
Other platforms: Learn how privacy works. Pinterest, for example, lets you create private boards. Make sure only people you trust follow you on Snapchat and know that there are loopholes through which people can take screenshots and save photos and videos on the platform without your notice.
Remove old platforms and pages
Have you ever had a Xanga, Live Journal, Myspace or similar account? It’s time to look for them and how to deactivate them. If the platforms are still running, then old pages and accounts may be viewable.