We’ve all posted things we wish we hadn’t on the Internet.
Some of us have silly pictures from high school floating around on Facebook, while others have made comments they’ve regretted on a friend’s Instagram Story. And while users are able to delete some of the content they post online, nothing can be permanently removed from the web.
Throughout the past few years, a number of influencers have run into trouble when their pasts came back to haunt them.
YouTube creators Zoe “Zoella” Sugg and Jack Maynard had unsavoury tweets resurface from years back, and were forced to deal with the consequences. Both influencers made public apologies on Twitter, but we’re sure the scandals cost them more than a few followers and, potentially, brand collaborations. They’re not the only influencers that have run into issues with past tweets and posts.
In 2017, editor Josh Rivers was fired over racist tweets he posted between 2010-2015. Hip hop artist Stormzy had to apologize for rude comments from his youth, telling his fans “I was young and proudly ignorant.”
Everyone makes mistakes, but an influencer has to deal with the whole digital world witnessing their slip-ups – even if an inappropriate tweet was posted years ago.
Worried About Your Digital Past?
Generally speaking, once something has been posted online it is there “forever”. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t take time to clean up your social media accounts.
While it may take you some time, we’ve got a few tips and tricks to make the process easiest for you. Check them out below…
How To Efficiently Find and Delete Old Tweets
Your Twitter feed might go back a few years, but there’s no need to spend hours scrolling through all of your old tweets. Make the most of Twitter’s Advanced Search feature, and search for specific words and/or phrases you don’t want associated with your account.
Advanced Search will then filter out your tweets, so you can go ahead and delete any inappropriate posts. Easy peasy.
If you’re looking to take extreme measures, or want to delete an entire account’s worth of tweets, consider checking out Tweet Deleter, Tweet Delete and Twit Wipe.
How To Efficiently Find and Delete Old Facebook Posts
Facebook isn’t as easy to “clean out” as Twitter.
The social networking platform is designed to encourage its users to share as much personal information as possible. Therefore, it may take you longer to find and delete questionable content than, say, Twitter or other platforms.
Users are able to view their entire activity history by visiting their profile and clicking Activity Log. (Yes, it’s a bit frightening to see every single post you’ve commented and interacted with since the dawn of your Facebook account.)
Depending on how much time you have, go can go through the log and review everything you’ve ever done on Facebook.
Keep in mind, there will probably be an extraordinary amount of information in the log. It would be a waste of time to examine every single comment, like and post you’ve ever made on Facebook.
But the good news is you can filter what you see in your Activity Log by year. If you had a particularly rebellious time period in your life and want to delete any inappropriate comments or posts from that era, you can go right to that particular time frame.
Otherwise, aside from setting your account to private, there isn’t much else you can do when it comes to reviewing your content.
Keep in mind…
Cleaning out old social media posts that no longer reflect new values can be tedious.
While it’s a good idea for influencers to delete old content that might be distasteful and not “on brand”, it’s important to note nothing can be permanently erased from the internet.
Bottom line: Always think carefully before you post.