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Every time you are online you create a trail of any information you have viewed or created. This is known as your digital footprint. The internet makes accessing and sharing this information very easy, so it is important to understand and consider your digital footprint whenever you are sharing pictures and videos, making posts and comments and chatting online. Leaving a positive digital footprint can be very beneficial to your reputation and future opportunities. Guiding young people to leave a positive digital footprint is a good way to build their positive reputation.

Why is your digital footprint important?

Your digital footprint can have a lasting impact on your reputation, relationships and employment opportunities (both positive and negative). Understanding how this works is an important step toward making this impact a positive one. To learn about why your digital footprint is important, watch the following Internet Society video.

Creating a positive digital footprint

Right or wrong, your digital footprint can affect your reputation, both online and off line. Creating a positive digital footprint is an important part of protecting your reputation, both now and for the future. For some ideas on achieving this, watch Katelin McClure's video on making a positive digital footprint.

Cleaning up your digital footprint

If you feel that your digital footprint does not reflect your best qualities, it is comforting to know that there are steps you can take to clean up your digital footprint (and improve your reputation). For practical advice on cleaning a digital footprint, read the ABC News article Protecting your children from their digital footprint.

To learn more about digital footprints, read the Scan journal article Expert insights into education for positive digital footprint development.

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Your digital footprint is the record of all your interactions online. Once something is posted or shared online, it can be there forever. Understanding your digital footprint helps you choose and control what you leave online for others to find.

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Why Does Your Digital Footprint Matter? - ID Incognito

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Why does your digital footprint matter? When you walk across a plush carpet, you leave footprints which can be vacuumed over to be removed. When you are online doing your normal activities, you leave a …

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Why Does Your Digital Footprint Matter?

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How to manage your digital footprint

Check what's out there

Googling your name will let you see what people, like your potential employers or friends, can find out about you. This can be anything from your local sport club making a post about your team on social media, to your own personal online accounts you have used, both currently and in the past.

Get posts/photos/videos taken down

If there are posts that you don't want people to find online, try asking the people who created them to take them down. If you or a friend have forgotten the details to an old account, it's still worth contacting the platform with identifying data and asking for their help.

Check your privacy settings

If you're surprised by what you find about yourself online, it's a good time to change your privacy settings. Check out The eSafety Guide to find out more about the privacy settings for particular social media platforms and how to change them.

Set boundaries on tagging

If you don't want to be tagged in a photo or post you're uncomfortable with, you can un-tag yourself or ignore a tag request.

Think before you engage

The things you like at 17 may not be what you like when you're 24. Before you engage with a post or page, ask yourself if what you're doing is something you want to be associated with long-term. You may like a page as a joke, but it's good to remember: others may not see the funny side.

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Digital footprint | eSafety Commissioner

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The internet remembers more about you than you might expect. It leaves a trail of data, known as your digital footprint.

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5 ways to clean up your digital footprint

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5 ways to clean up your digital footprint

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myfuture - Australia's National Career Information Service | myfuture

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Shape your future with myfuture - sign up or log in to Australia's National Career Information Service.

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Give A Grad A Go - Graduate Recruitment Agency

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Digital reputation | What comes up when you Google yourself?

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Students learn that the information they put online leaves a digital footprint, or "trail," which can be big or small, and helpful or hurtful, depending on how they manage it.

(To view subtitles, click on the white box at the bottom right of the video.)

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Follow the Digital Trail | Common Sense Education

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Follow the Digital Trail is a video from Common Sense Education. Use this video to help your students learn and thrive in our connected world.

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Teen Voices: Oversharing and Your Digital Footprint

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Digital footprints are impressions, data and social media/websites you browse which builds a persona online, helping the internet advertise to you and people hiring to see who you are.

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A digital footprint is the information that we leave behind on the internet from accessing websites or buying things online.

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Our digital reputation matters because it can be later on used against us. It is about the information we search and basically describes our online self meaning it does matter. Our search history our what we post online can effect us depending on how we use the internet correctly.

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A digital footprint can often be referred to as the trail of data you leave behind when you are using the internet. Your digital footprint can significantly impact your reputation and any future opptunites.

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Due to the existence of 'Digital footprints', and continual development of technology, it becomes evident that public information is becoming easier and easier to access, thus, making it important to track what you post because it can create a big impact on your future.

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Digital reputation is important because everyone on the internet can see any activity that we do and it remains on the internet permanently.
I learnt that my information is tracked because of personalised ads but can also be for bad intentions like tracking your data

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In an age where information is public-domain for a lot of people, it can be easy for employers to find your digital footprint and see what type of person you are based on social media profiles.

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1. Audit your accounts. Do an audit of the accounts or profiles that you have created online.

2. Delete and deactivate. Try to find your old accounts, delete information and deactivate the accounts.

3. Do a Google search.

4. Manage your privacy settings.

5. Curate your online presence.

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How to delete 99.9%* of your digital footprint

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How to delete 99.9%* of your digital footprint

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(Image credit: Getty Images)

Most creatives use the internet as the main portal to get their work seen. Cultivating a popular social media account can get you an audience of millions, and what's not to love about that? Well, an active online life could leave you vulnerable to hackers and with cyber attacks on the rise, it's worth being a little paranoid.

With so much of yourself now out there on the web for anyone to see (on any of the top social media platforms and beyond), it's hard to keep track of exactly what type of information is stored where. And if your personal or financial information is floating around on the net, it's the perfect target for hackers to steal.

Luckily, ex-hacker and Twitter user @somenerdliam stepped in last year, with his thread "How to delete 99.9% of your digital footprint from the internet", and the grateful Twitterverse went wild for it. Since posting, it's been retweeted 114,000 times and received over 425.1 likes. It's vital information for the modern world, and we think everyone should know about it.

(Image credit: Kaitlyn Baker)

While his advice isn't going to help you disappear completely (the author admits his knowledge isn't completely up to date, and the "99.9" claim in his title isn't a practical claim), the tips in the thread are a good starting point when it comes to monitoring your digital hygiene.

It makes for chilling reading. Not only does it ask you to trawl through a decade's worth of email addresses, it also acts as a wake up call to the amount of data people willingly share. Take a look at some of the stand-out points below.

To read the full thread, click here.

One point highlights the importance of using a VPN, which @somenerdliam admits is a personal preference. Find the right one for you with our guide to the best VPN services in 2020.

And as for @somenerdliam, he's not letting his new-found viral fame go to his head. Instead, he's been wondering why the thread struck a chord. His conclusion being that the tips were popular because they were accessible.
Related articles:

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How to delete 99.9%* of your digital footprint

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(Image credit: Getty Images) Most creatives use the internet as the main portal to get their work seen. Cultivating a popular social media account can get you an audience of millions, and what's not to love about that? Well, an active online life could leave you vulnerable to hackers and with cyber attacks on the rise, it's worth being a little paranoid.

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An active online life could leave you vulnerable to hackers and with cyber attacks on the rise, it's worth being a little paranoid. Getting a vpn can help you reduce the risk

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A footprint may be stored in an online database as a "hit" in an online environment. The footprint may track the user's IP address, when it was created, where it came from, and the footprint later being analyzed.

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Whatever we are doing on the internet we can leave a trail of information behind us which people can use to determine what we might be interested in buying, or for other less savoury purposes such as trying to hack into our online accounts and trying to access passwords etc.

So what is a digital footprint?

A digital footprint is data that is left behind when users have been online. There are two types of digital footprints which are passive and active. A passive footprint is made when information is collected from the user without the person knowing this is happening. An active digital footprint is where the user has deliberately shared information about themselves either by using social media sites or by using websites.

An example of a passive digital footprint would be where a user has been online and information has been stored on an online database. This can include where they came from, when the footprint was created and a user IP address. A footprint can also be analysed offline and can be stored in files which an administrator can access. These would include information on what that machine might have been used for, but not who had performed the actions.

An example of an active digital footprint is where a user might have logged into a site when editing or making comments such as on an online forum or a social media site. The registered name or profile can be linked to the posts that have been made and it is surprisingly easy to find out a lot about a person from the trails you leave behind.

Web browsing and digital footprints

The digital footprint we leave after browsing websites is called the internet footprint. These are commonly called "cookies" and most websites will ask you to accept the use of cookies before you can access the site, without actually knowing what this means. If we inadvertently leave a lot of information about ourselves behind it could be passively or actively collected by other people just by using a simple search engine.

It is becoming more and more common for employers to "cyber vet" prospective employees based on their online activities. Digital footprints can also be used by the police to gather information about individuals to help them with their enquiries.

Social networking sites can also give a very good idea of an individual's life. These sites can allow digital tracing data which can include what social groups they belong to, their interests, location etc. This data can be gathered and analysed without the users being aware that this is happening.

A lot of employers will also use social media to vet prospective employees so it is important that you are mindful as to what you post on any such sites. Of course there is no limit as to how far you can go back in time on social media sites and once something is posted, there is no way of removing it completely. Others might have commented or shared your posts and this in turn will create their own digital footprint. This is something that needs to be discussed with your children and teenagers so they can be educated and are aware what might happen to that information.

So how much privacy do we really have?

Digital footprints including the meta data and content does impact on security, privacy and trust. As the internet becomes bigger and bigger it is becoming increasingly important to think about what might happen to the ownership of the photos that you own and content that you write. Remember that what goes on the internet normally stays there even if you do delete posts there will be a trail of data that you have left behind.

Talking to your child or teen

Have a chat with them when you know they are using social media sites, or on the internet.

Let them know what is expected of them and what is a "no go".

Explain the dangers of posting content that you feel might be inappropriate or controversial and the trail that can be left behind.

Ensure that they know the dangers of posting content and personal details including pictures.

Encourage them not to divulge any personal details such as age, address or contact details to anyone online.

If they feel they might have put themselves in danger, or feel in danger remember to reassure them that you are always there to support them.

Many people want to share the fact that they are going on holiday and how long they are going for - think about the impact and danger this could be placing your family in.

It is a criminal offence to use the internet to threaten or harass people.

We hope that this has helped you understand a little more about digital footprints. We have tried to make it as simple as possible so feel free to share this with friends and family who might feel a little confused about this topic.

This article is supported by The Ben Cohen Stand Up Foundation.

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Whatever we are doing on the internet we can leave a trail of information behind us which people can use to determine what we might be interested in buying, or for other less savoury purposes such as trying to hack into our online accounts and trying to access passwords etc.