Identity, privacy, security and trust
If I was trying to be intentionally opaque, I’d claim that an individual’s online presence is an evolving product of externalities shaping and shaped by perceptions of social standing and political affiliation, economic pressures, professional imperatives and a bubbling stew of intersecting gender/sexual/racial/caste/class/ability identities.
Hopefully your eyes skipped the rest of that sentence.
Thinking about what is important, or of concern for an individual’s online presence isn’t going to be a one-size-fits all proposition for every stage of an individual’s life or for every career. A public figure isn’t necessarily going to care too much about their profile’s accuracy to their date of birth, pet’s name or high school details (unless they are stupid enough to use it as their password reset) as such matters are traditionally made matters of public record. Likewise for retirees or employees transitioning to retirement - they are unlikely to need to worry too much about their personal lives being a liability to future employment (although given their senior status as potentially vulnerable citizens it may be wiser to not advertise everything).
For current participants in the curret generation of social networks (eg: almost anyone who’s given Facebook their full name, actual birthdate, home town and filled in that “what’s your porn actor/actress name” quiz which asks for the street you lived in and your pet’s name while growing up) most of the damage has already been done. Their most frequently referenced personal identifiers have become known to certain corporations which may not all be particularly nice/play well with others, and they may need to start seeding inaccurate information into those networks in an attempt to improve their privacy levels. But new digital citizens (eg: mostly teenagers) are uniquely placed to determine the extent to which their identities online are a reflection of their private lives and, hopefully, they will be taught tools which will enable them to limit their exposure to potential privacy breeches based upon the mistakes of previous generations .
Ideally, an individual’s online presence should be catered to three different (and not mutually exclusive) levels of privacy (ordered from most controlled to least):
Tier 1. Personal information that people share with their close friends, eg: full name, precise DOB, phone numbers, those photos of what you did last summer, what you thought of last night’s episode of Q and A, your location last Friday night between 9pm and 10pm).
This type of information would normally be kept online on a blog with high privacy settings, and/or Facebook/MySpace/other-recreational-social-network behind some hefty privacy settings on said recreational-social-network. That is, if you feel you can trust such social networks. [Note: would-be political candidates of mainstream parties in democratic societies should probably have almost nothing of interest in this area if they want to be viable candidates in the future].
Possibly a safe space to express your opinion about your boss/coworkers/bus-driver/car-mechanic using the full extent of your vocabulary, probably not.
Tier 2. Personal information that people share with work colleagues and contacts, such as their professional portfolio, education, training and job history, etc.
This type of information would probably reside on work-related social networks, like LinkedIn or Monster.com.
Which may be a liability in the workplace if your manager doesn’t like their employees being poached.
Tier 3. A less private level of personal information which is likely to be relatively* impact-free if made public knowledge and maybe of interest to commercial or political entities (eg: I prefer Toyotas to Fords, I’m a Mac, preferred to Hillary to Obama but contributed to both, want a carbon tax, etc).
This stuff should be kept on recreational social networks available to all if at all, unless it’s relevant to an individual’s work situation.
*If you don't mind targeted ads, possibly unaccountable corporations knowing your every spending pattern (including your daily movements like when you are home), etc.
Of course, an individual’s entire life may not always suit such a simplified tier system. A guiding principle for all online interactions should be whether or not an individual would feel comfortable sharing said information with anyone that individual might see on the street who will then have the opportunity to repeat that information at the worst possible time, and exercising discretion accordingly.
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