Social Networking – Don’t Let It Cost You Your Job!
Social networking sites like Facebook and Myspace are so common it seems like people everywhere have joined. These sites are great for keeping in touch with current friends and family, reconnecting with old friends and even meeting new friends and professional contacts. But if you’re not careful these sites can turn into your worst nightmare!
Many people don’t realize how public their social networking activity can actually be. Every photo, status update, hobby and personal piece of information you or others post could be open for anyone to read. If you’re not careful that photo of you binge drinking or getting sick at last weekends party could cost you your job!
Employers frequently use search engines and social networking sites to assist with screening possible future employees and current employees. Luckily the social networking sites are getting better at providing security and privacy settings that give you some control on what others see … use them, and SOON!
Facebook and Myspace both have security and privacy settings that can get quite granular and allow you to control every aspect of who can see which parts of your profile. It’s definitely worth taking an hour or so to go through all of the available settings to make sure your information can only be viewed by the people you want to see it.
Stay tuned, I am currently working on an article to help you understand the security and privacy controls on Facebook. I’ll explain some areas that can be a little confusing and provide suggestions for managing different types of contacts individually (i.e. professional vs friends). I’ll provided some examples of how my account is set up and I’ll also highlight areas you want to be sure tol locked down!
I’ll update this post with a link once it’s complete but you can also keep your eye out buy subscribing to the RSS feed in your favorite reader or through email using the form at the top right corner of any page.
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