If someone is looking for information about you, what’s the first thing they will do?
Yep, they will fire up Google and do a search.
It is good practice to periodically search for yourself on Google. Be sure to include any variations on your name.
Here’s what I would use…
- “Dan Strom”
- “Daniel Strom”
- “Daniel L Strom”
There are some other variations, but I never go by those, so I would not check them.
This might be a particularly wise thing for college students to do, especially if they are looking for a job.
So what do you do if the search returns some pages with inaccurate, or not-so-nice information about you?
- You can contact Google to have the search information purged from their indices.
- You can also contact the authors of the pages to request that they remove the information.
- In the event of serious libel, an attorney specializing in Internet issues might need to be found.
- If nothing else, at least you now know what is out there and you can be ready to address the issue if it ever arises.
So, here’s the warning. Information put on the Internet is available even after it is removed. The Wayback Machine has historical views of many pages on the Internet.
The final bit of advice is that you need to be careful about the information you choose to put on the Internet about yourself. But, you also need to be diligent in checking what others have put out about you.
What else can you think of to protect yourself?
- Dan
