ERASING YOUR DIGITAL DOPPELGANGER
You may want to erase your
questionable past from social media, with potential employers and partners on
the prowl. And pressing delete is no longer your only option. Here's how to
clear your online trail
Timehop is a fun app that
digs through your online past, presenting you with posts, tweets and photos
that you shared on social media years ago. Each day is a surprise, and you'll
often be shown a Facebook post or an Instagram image that you've probably
forgotten about. It can be a pleasant shot of nostalgia or an embarrassing
reminder of the person you once were, but it exemplifies one simple fact the
internet never forgets.
There's a lot of talk these
days about going on a social media detox by taking a break from obsessing over
retweets and Instagram likes. But sometimes, you might want to go beyond just a
temporary timeout from social media. You're no longer the person you once were
when you first opened your Facebook and Twitter accounts, and you may not want
the HR manager at your next potential workplace or your new girlfriendboyfriend
to see your impulsive Twitter rants or the selfies you took with your ex. Or
maybe, you just want to cut it all out from your life or wipe the slate clean
and start over with a brand new online persona.
THINK TWICE
Deleting your social media
profiles and accounts from online services like Google is an extreme step and
one that you shouldn't take impulsively. Remember, the very nature of social
networks is such that everything is interconnected. Take that questionable
Facebook post you shared with a friend for instance.You may remove the post
itself, but a link to it will remain on your friend's account, even if the
original post is no longer present. This rule applies to all of social media.
If you do decide that deleting
all your online accounts is the way to go, consider the various options that
these services offer. Social networks like Facebook and Twitter allow you to
deactivate your account rather than deleting them outright. This makes your
profile and posts inacces sible to the world, but all your posts and images
will remain, should you ever decide to come back. If your decision to leave was
made on an impulse, this option is a godsend and it will keep you from making a
mistake you will regret.
Unlike deactivating,
deleting accounts is permanent -all your posts, contacts and images are lost
-and there's no coming back from it.So think twice before you delete your
accounts.
If you've made your mind,
however, here's how you can go about erasing your online self. Before you
begin, keep in mind that most of these services can only be deleted via their
desktop websites and not through their mobile apps.
GOOGLE
This is the big one. The
benefit of a Google account is that one log-in gives you access to a variety of
services that have become essential to us.Gmail, YouTube, Google+, Hangouts,
Google Maps, Google Drive -these are all linked to one Google account. It's
super convenient, but it also means that you can't delete one and retain the
others. There's no way you can delete your YouTube account while still
retaining Gmail. If removing all traces of your online persona is your goal,
you'll have to delete your main Google account. Before you do that, bear in
mind that you need a Google account for any Android device you may use, and if
you use your Google account to sign into third-party services, like Airbnb,
you'll be locked out of those.
You'll also lose all
content associated with your Google account, including your photos and
documents on Google Docs and the apps you purchased from the PlayStore. If you
do decide to return to Google in the future, you won't be able to use the same
login name as that will be lost forever.
To delete your Google
account, sign in and go to `My account'.Under `Account preferences', click on
`Delete your account or services', followed by `Delete Google account and
data'.
FACEBOOK
Facebook doesn't want you
to leave, and so you'll have to jump through quite a few hoops to actually
delete your account.Deactivate your account instead of deleting it as it will
make your account unusable and inaccessible to your friends and the public.Your
friends won't be able to tag you either. To the outside world, deactivating
your account will essentially erase you from Facebook, but the benefit here is
that if you ever decide to come back, all your friends, posts and photos will
be waiting for you.
But if you do decide to go
all the way and delete your account, you'll first want to disassociate your
account from all services that you access using your Facebook account. You'll
also want to remove all apps that you've added to your account. Finally, if
you're the administrator for any Facebook Pages or Groups, designate another
person as admin so that those Pages Groups don't disappear with you.
You also might want to
download all your Facebook data before you leave for good. The option can be
found in the `General' section of your account settings. The delete account
option isn't available within your settings, so you'll have to visit the URL `https:http:www.facebook.comhelpdelete_account'
to access it.Your account won't be deleted right away but within two weeks, and
if you happen to log in within this cool-off period, your deletion request will
be cancelled. Once it is deleted, Facebook says it will take up to 90 days for
all content related to your account to be deleted, although the account itself
will be deleted.
TWITTER
Twitter doesn't offer
separate deactivation and delete processes, but deactivating your account is
the only way to delete it. Like Facebook, deactivating your account makes your
profile and tweets inaccessible to the outside world, but you'll be able to
come back and all your content will be as you left it.
To deactivate your account,
sign in and head to `Account settings', where you'll find the `Deactivate my
account' option. If you do not sign into your deactivated account for 30 days,
Twitter will initiate the process of deleting it, which could take up to a
week. Bear in mind that you won't be able to use the email address associated
with this account to open a new Twitter account in the future.
INSTAGRAM
To temporarily disable your
Instagram account, log in to your account from the service's desktop website,
go to your profile and select `Temporarily disable my account'. To delete your
account permanently, go to the URL `https:http:www.instagram.comaccountsremove
requestpermanent' once logged in.
Snapchat doesn't offer a
temporary deactivation option and neither can you delete your account via the
app. To delete, log into your account from the desktop website. Under the
account settings, click on `delete my account'.
LINKEDIN
You can always overhaul
your Linkedin profile rather than deleting your account, but if you choose to
do the latter, head to `Privacy and settings', where under the `Subscriptions'
category, you can click on `Closing your account'.
WHATSAPP
WhatsApp can only be
deleted via the app itself. Once you delete your account, you will lose all the
information related to it, including your chat logs, friends and groups. The
process varies a bit depending on the operating system of your phone, but on
Android and iOS, you can delete your account by heading into `Settings', then
`Account' and selecting `Delete my account'.
YOU CAN'T GET RID OF IT ALL
Despite your best efforts
to erase all traces of your online presence, there's only so much that you can
do. If you had set up your social media accounts to share your posts, tweets or
photos publicly, chances are that those posts were then picked up and archived
by several other websites. Getting your posts off those websites may be
impossible, so your content may still pop up in Google searches.
Thanks to the way search
engines work, your name and profiles may continue to show up in Google searches
even after your account has been deleted since Google creates a cache of web
pages that remain accessible for a while. Over time, however, it will be like
you were never there.
SERVICES YOU CAN LEAVE
REDDIT:
The Reddit community has
helped save lives but it also has a notorious dark side to it. It's easy to not
get sucked into the sometimes negative discussions that mushroom in your
favourite Subreddits, and this is something you may not want your real-life
acquaintances to see.Preferences > `Delete' tab
CHANGE.ORG:
It takes little for people
to create rash online petitions and even less for others to sign them in the
heat of the moment, but these may not always be causes you support in the long
term. So if you'd rather not have others see the petitions you've signed, you
can delete your Change.org account.Account settings > Close account
Quora is a useful platform
for those seeking answers to their queries from other people, but you may not
necessarily want a potential employer looking into the discussions you've
participated in.Privacy settings > Delete account
TRUECALLER:
Truecaller is a
crowd-sourced caller ID service for smartphones that displays your name when
you call someone who doesn't have your number saved. Since this information is
provided to the service by other users, it may be inaccurate or may be wrongly
marked as spam. Or maybe you just don't want your number listed. You can fill
up a form to request Truecaller to unlist your number.https:http:www.truecaller.comunlist
|
Sameer Desai
|
MM11APR16
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