Legal Contexts and Digital Identities
Up until recently, I have been a teacher within the community in which I live. This was a fantastic position while my young children were at primary/intermediate age, because throughout working full time, I could also play an active role in their daily life at school - attending sporting activities, participating in their learning experiences, watching their assembly items and sharing moments of celebration. This seemed an idilic situation, however, as time passed and social media usage increased, I began to feel it become increasingly difficult to keep my private digital identity separate from my professional one.
Facebook
I have had a Facebook account since 2006. Initially it was a place to share photos with family and close friends. Over time my list of friends grew although I have always been mindful of whom I accept or request as a 'friend' - especially if they too lived in the same community and had children that attended my school. As a teacher in a small community, I already felt that my private life was merging with my professional one, so it was only natural to want to do the most that I could to protect my privacy, and that of my family.
Unfortunately, this 'privacy' has slowly disintegrated over time. An example was when a 'friend' posted photos of myself at a party which were viewable by not only parents of students who were 'friends' of the party host, but also their children as they had Facebook accounts too. Although there was nothing wrong with the photos in general (they were of me dancing at the party), I did feel that my private life had been invaded - my private digital identity had been exposed.
Webwise.ie suggest teachers check their privacy settings when using social media, e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Google+ or Instagram. They also suggest that profile photos should be generic and holiday photos should be set to private. My main reason for having a Facebook account is to share photos with family and friends, so instead of setting these to 'private', I have them set as viewable by family and friends only - not public. Profile photos, on the other hand, can only be set as 'public' so I am cautious about which ones I use for my profile picture.
An additional security measure suggested by Webwise.ie is to prevent search engines linking to a profile by editing the search engine options in privacy settings. This is a useful strategy because it's interesting to see what pops up when you type your name into a search engine.
Type your name online - what will you find?
I have had a Facebook account since 2006. Initially it was a place to share photos with family and close friends. Over time my list of friends grew although I have always been mindful of whom I accept or request as a 'friend' - especially if they too lived in the same community and had children that attended my school. As a teacher in a small community, I already felt that my private life was merging with my professional one, so it was only natural to want to do the most that I could to protect my privacy, and that of my family.
Unfortunately, this 'privacy' has slowly disintegrated over time. An example was when a 'friend' posted photos of myself at a party which were viewable by not only parents of students who were 'friends' of the party host, but also their children as they had Facebook accounts too. Although there was nothing wrong with the photos in general (they were of me dancing at the party), I did feel that my private life had been invaded - my private digital identity had been exposed.
Webwise.ie suggest teachers check their privacy settings when using social media, e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Google+ or Instagram. They also suggest that profile photos should be generic and holiday photos should be set to private. My main reason for having a Facebook account is to share photos with family and friends, so instead of setting these to 'private', I have them set as viewable by family and friends only - not public. Profile photos, on the other hand, can only be set as 'public' so I am cautious about which ones I use for my profile picture.
An additional security measure suggested by Webwise.ie is to prevent search engines linking to a profile by editing the search engine options in privacy settings. This is a useful strategy because it's interesting to see what pops up when you type your name into a search engine.
Digital Footprint
Many online accounts will add details to your digital footprint. The first time I typed in my name on a search, I was shocked to see how much was linked to my name.
Screenshot taken 16 March 2016
Although there was nothing to be ashamed of, it was disturbing to see how much was visible to the world. I was also concerned to see that many of the items were linked to learning that I had done with students from previous years. I began to wonder how these students will feel in years to come... to know that their learning is visible to the public through something that I had created in previous years. Has their digital footprint been created through my own doing? Fortunately, I have only used their first names (standard precaution when being a digital citizen), but it is frightening to see how open our lives are once we engage with an online environment.
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