Jeremy Stark
I've always thought that I was careful about what they posted online. From a young age I have participated in a wide variety of social media platforms. An unfortunately large amount of time each day is spent scrolling through Reddit, or talking to my friends on Facebook. Even with using these services, I have tried to limit what was shared. This is not because I think any of the information is going to damage me, or is too personal. Instead, I've tried to limit what was shown just because it makes me more comfortable knowing my Facebook information is only seen by people I know. As much as I've tried to limit what is available, I have always been worried that what little privacy settings I have control over were not enough to actually limit the available information. Through this project I was able to see that both my efforts to stay private have worked, and that what little information is available does represent me, however limited of a representation it is.
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Contents
Collecting Data
Google Search
Taking all of what I said into account, I knew that a google search might not be the most effective. In fact, searching for just my name did not reveal any data on me after looking at the first 10 pages. This was not totally surprising, as my name is not terribly unique. I tried adding my middle name, Brandon. However this resulted in a new problem. The vast majority of results were related to the character Bran Stark from Game of Thrones. After finally adding my city to the mix, I got my first result related to me. But even then I was not first on the list. What I found was my LinkedIn profile, one of the few sites where I had elected to make my information public due to the nature of the site. I would say that the LinkedIn Profile is fairly accurate, as its accuracy is important for the job market. I then tried using other terms, such as the name of my high school, Michigan, as well as my address. Besides the LinkedIn page, I found some old results from high school debate, and a profiling website that while it got my phone number, school, and age right, which was widely wrong about user IDs and emails. I also saw some information on my parents, but none of that was linked to me. So far it seemed as if my efforts to stay private had been working. [243]
Searching Websites
One thing I was expecting to see, but never found was references to my Facebook or Instagram accounts. I know I asked them to hide a lot of my information from the public, but figured it didn't do much as I don't exactly trust Facebook. I decided that searching these websites might change the results, but it did not. I then checked to see my settings, and found some that I wished to change, but overall Facebook was behaving exactly as I had hoped it would. I tried other websites. Youtube and other search engines yielded similar results. This was almost shocking. No matter how hard I tried to control my privacy online, I figured that it would be futile. Seeing that going through these settings actually impacted my identity on the web was not something I expected to find. [140,555]
Searching for Usernames
I decided that the only way to find information on myself, was to leverage my own unique knowledge of myself. By this I mean searching for usernames that I use, that while my friends know, have yet to appear in my searches. This reveled the most amount of information besides LinkedIn, however none of it was very personal. This included accounts for games (such as League of Legends and Beat Saber), a blank Github, a blank Twitch account, my Twitter account with 1 tweet, and my Reddit account. Out of all of these, the Reddit account was the only one with any real information on me. This was the only account I was actively worrying about. From this you could tell I was somehow affiliated with the university of Michigan, play a variety of video games, and enjoy technology. But there was still no way for this username to be linked to my name. [154,709]
What the available information says about me
Even with little information to go off of, it says a lot about me. Firstly, the absence of information itself shows that I am data conscious. In addition to that it paints a picture that I enjoy technology and video games, as well as support Michigan and UCLA. All of this information is correct, and in the abstract I would agree with this assessment. However, when diving into the details it gets a bit more fuzzy. Some of these accounts are from long ago, for games I no longer play, while others I continue playing to this day. The search results are unable to differentiate between the two. You would also think that I do not use social media, which I would disagree with. However this has made me think. Most of my interactions are liking posts or reading through, not posting or commenting myself. Can this be considered active, if others aren't there to view what you do? Seeing that I comment once every few months on Reddit would not lead someone to believe I use it a lot, but in reality I spend hours every day for the last 10 years. Someone would also be led to believe, correctly, that the reason for LinkedIn being public is my effort to find a job. My online identity does paint a generic picture of myself that is accurate, but only the details, of which there are few, are misleading. [948]
Why I choose to limit public information
Two things that became apparent is that I have done a decent job in my quest to limit information, and that there has been a shift in recent years towards this even more. Going further back in my public Reddit posts, you would see more engagement with others. As I grew up, I realized the importance of limiting what is available online. I still want people I know to be able to access my email or phone number, but I do not feel comfortable having it easily available. I know that information like this is still online, but the more difficult it is to find it, the better I feel. The fact that the most information came from a username that is not able to be found online makes me feel better as well. It also makes sense that Reddit has the most information, as it is form of social media that is least attached to you as a person. However, this exercise has taught me some important things about what actions I should take in the future, and how I'm perceived online. Firstly, if I want to engage on social media, I will do so with accounts not tied to my name. Secondly, what is out there is not stuff that I feel the need to take down, as it does not misinform people, yet it cannot be used to specifics but instead general trends. It is important for me to remember that while to the public it might seem as if I haven't given out much information, companies like Facebook still have it all. Whether my desire for privacy is one from companies or the general public is something I am not sure about. [286]
