Digital Tattoos
In today’s digital world, some people have made careers out of their online personas. My sister and I tease my husband for being a “finfluencer” posting all his fishing pictures and gear and some of my students want to grow up to be YouTube or Instagram famous. Whether or not we are on a mission to be internet famous, we all have an online presence. I decided to take dive into what my digital tattoo actually is.
Digital Mining
Content as well as Confused
Overall I was not surprised by the information I found. As I have mentioned before, I do not have a strong online presence. While in the past, I was on social media I am no longer an active user. I have not deleted my accounts, but they did not come up on any searches. I was especially happy I didn’t have to relive my MySpace days. Completing a simple Google search of myself even took some digging to find the real me. Who knew there were so many Rachael Hofmanns in the world? Eventually I came across the YouTube channel I created to post my Trends in Ed Tech video, basic information on the White Pages, my school website, and the obituary for my husband’s grandmother from 2016. Even my deep dive didn’t yield that much more information. I checked Peek You, True People Search, Truthfinders, and Radaris. On each of these websites my name, age, and known family members we given. A few had my current phone number which I didn’t love, but I did find it funny that one of my known phone numbers was my husband’s house phone number from growing up. I did not find any of this information too shocking or scandalous. I honestly thought I would find more information. I was glad that my daughter’s name was never associated with mine. I don’t need my 16 month old having an online presence yet.
There were a couple things that did surprise me however. The first was that I only found my most current address on one of the websites. I moved in June and it seems like records haven’t been updated which I found interesting. I was also surprised to see that all the sights listed Charlotte, North Carolina as a previous address for me. I have never even been to North Carolina, but it is where my parents met so somehow that got connected to me. The other surprising piece of information was a known associate I had on the true people search. True people listed the most known relatives of any of the sites and in the possible associates list it included my father-in-law’s ex wife (not my husband’s mom) whom I have never met.
Digital Tattoos and Education
It is important for our students to know that their information is out in the world and how it can be used. At the beginning of the year, we complete digital citizenship lessons and one focuses on phishing scams. I had conversations with my students about the type of information that gets put out just by logging into different websites (birth year, name, etc.) and how that information could be used. I was pleasantly surprised that many students had clearly had conversations with their parents about the risks associated with this. I think starting in upper elementary, possibly third grade, we should start talking with a smart online presence with our students. We could invite their parents to complete a digital mine to start the conversation and continue the conversations as we explore new websites and log into new places.
Hi Rachael,
ReplyDeleteI thought your post was great; my experience with the self-data dive was very similar to yours, in that there wasn't a ton of shocking information that I realized people could find about me, as well as a few clear examples of misinformation where some random connection to others somehow got attributed to me, or a family member's phone number was actually listed as mine. Similar to you, I would not describe my online presence as robust by any means; I wonder for both of us if/how the expansion of our PLN and online activity related to EdTech could end up changing our digital tattoo.
I agree with your point about the importance of teaching this to students. Just as most schools now have some piece of the curriculum dedicated to responsible use, digital citizenship, etc., having awareness of what personal information is actually out there, and how to control that, are important things for our students to understand. I do think that they fact that students have grown up with so much more of their lives being lived online has helped them gain some sense of this already, but as you noted it is something that should also be educated from a fairly early age, especially knowing that students are gaining their digital tattoos at an earlier and earlier age as well!
Fantastic idea to have parents do a data dig on themselves!
ReplyDeleteHi Rachel,
ReplyDeleteHaving conversations with parents as soon as possible about the importance of digital mines is a great idea. We have had incidences at my school where students created TikTok videos to make fun of students and posted them online. They had user names that clearly identified who they were, making the videos easy to discover by their teachers. This incident proves that, as teachers, we are responsible for helping students create a positive online presence.
Rachel great post! Similar to you I found 3 cities listed for me that I never have lived in or any of my family for that matter. Also the information that I found wasn't too surprising. I did find it funny that I didn't find any wedding registry or website information, but maybe its because I was married 13 yrs ago. Students are online now at a much younger age and they need to be aware of how their actions now could have impact on their future. Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteI agree that schools/teachers play an important role in helping our students create an digital tattoo that is positive and reflects oneself in a good light. My husband's cousin had a job offer rescinded after college because of something that she posted/said on Twitter awhile ago.