One of the main uses of a smartphone is social sharing. Nowadays, we stay connected by talking to our friends, as well as sharing our photos and thoughts with them, online. But social sharing can easily turn into social oversharing. This can annoy your friends, but it also put your personal safety at risk.

Stalkers can read your personal scrapbook

Your social media profile is like an open book for stalkers. Even if you’ve restricted your audience to your friends, digital stalkers can access the content you post. Photos, check-ins and posts can easily tell a stalker where you are. By following you for a longer period of time, they can understand your daily schedule and what you like. When they know this, it is easy to befriend you or find you on the street, at home or at the office.

To protect yourself from stalkers, limit the people who can see your location. You can also adjust the audience for every single post, so only trusted friends can see where you are. You can also choose to use WhatsApp or similar apps to socialize with your friends, avoiding social media. Depending on your smartphone settings, your posts can reveal your location by default, so check your GPS settings.

Thieves can’t wait your last post

Stalkers are not the only ones who can’t wait for your next post. Especially those which refer to where you are. Check-ins, posts about future travel plans are telling thieves when you are not home. Sometimes, they also tell how long you will be gone. Another type of posts thieves can use are those which reveal what you have inside the house. Expensive gadgets or home decor items, like paintings, which can be stolen and sold on the black market are hunted online by thieves. To protect yourself try to avoid posting when you are not home, your plans to leave home, especially for a long time. Also, never post that you are home alone.

Anything you post can be used against you

Lawyers often use social media posts during trials, both in someone’s defense and to attack people. For example, if you are in the middle of a custody battle and you post a selfie from a wild party, it can be used in court to support your partner’s claims that you are unfit to have the child’s custody.

We often tend to pick up our smartphone and post something when we are angry, which can also be used in court to demonstrate that you are aggressive or you have anger management issues.

Your job can depend on oversharing

When you are posting on social media during office hours, you might easily get in trouble. Employers are not happy to see that you are spending your time socializing instead of working, so you might get penalized for this. Posting things about work or about your employer can even lead to more severe consequences. Not to mention posting pictures from a holiday when you are on a sick leave!

Before you post something review who can see it and think what consequences it can have upon your life, both personal and professional. After hitting the “Post” button, you are fully responsible for the content of that post.

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