These days you would be hard pressed to find a college student who does not engage with social media daily. Or hourly, for that matter. There are so many different platforms to be on these days and most college students are on several, all at the same time. Whether the apps are intended for sharing photos, making jokes, posting videos, or dating, there are ways that the technology can be used to help in life, but they can also put your safety at risk. Here are 5 things college students should never do on social media.
- Reveal Your Address
When you are posting on social media you want to make sure that you don’t reveal too much about where you live or the places you frequent. If you are posting multiple times each day and often in the same places, or if your location is automatically added to your posts, then it may become easy for people who don’t know you to find you. If your account isn’t private, then it can be difficult to prevent weird strangers from becoming obsessed and stalking you.
- Badmouth People You Know
If you have an argument with your boss or one of your professors at University of San Francisco, the last thing you want to do is write anything about that argument on social media. Those things are very easy to find and if you say anything particularly derogatory you could get yourself into a lot of trouble. Just be sure that if you have a problem with someone, don’t address it with the whole world, address it in person or privately.
- Incriminate Yourself
If you are ever engaged, or in the presence of people who are engaged in any kind of illegal activity, the last thing you want to do is post a picture of it or write about it on social media. If there are photos of yourself on the internet where any kind of alcohol, drugs, graffiti, or other of contraband is present, you could really burn a lot of bridges and potentially get yourself into hot water.
- Exploit yourself
There are a lot of ways to express who you are on social media without exposing too much of your personal self. Whether that be in regard to your body, your morals, or any aspect of yourself that you want to keep private. If someone takes a picture of you that you don’t like and they post it on social media, be sure to tell them that you don’t want it on the internet and make sure that take it down. You may not have any legal recourse, but you should always do your best to reason with people.
- Start Flame Wars
It’s important that you don’t engage with trolls on social media. You will find them everywhere, and they will always be ranting in all caps about something that they don’t know much about. As maddening as it can be to read the things that they write, it’s important that you don’t take the bait. If you have one simple and logical point to make, there’s no harm in letting your opinion be heard, but if the person is crazy, just let them be crazy.