Whenever you’re posting online, you probably don’t think about who will see it in the future; you post it thinking only your friends and family will look at it. That’s the case for the most part, but if your posts are public, anybody can see it at any time. Things you say online will be there forever, even if you delete it.

A recent scandal has been going on with conspiracy theory guru/YouTuber Shane Dawson regarding his online persona. Earlier in the week he made a tweet talking about some “rumors” surrounding things he had done with his cat:

Looking further, I found an article on Refinery29 explaining his tweets and the scandal all together. The article mentions that Dawson had said in a podcast episode a few years ago that he had some sexual experiences with his cat, Cheeto.

There have been other scandals surrounding Dawson and other internet personalities, involving offensive things they have said in online or in videos. Even though the podcast episodes and YouTube videos have been deleted, it obviously doesn’t mean people have forgotten about it and it can come back to haunt you.

Most college-aged students grew up online and on social media, with a majority of us making our Twitter or Facebook accounts before the required age. I know that I have made some embarrassing tweets in my past and there’s for sure some questionable things in my Facebook likes. Now that I’m older and my online persona has changed, I make sure to, every once in a while, go through and delete some things from my social media.

Within just a few seconds an employer can find your Twitter account and discover you have been tweeting about illegal drug use. Using any type of illegal drugs could be against company policy and just because of that tweet, you could lose a job offer.

On Twitter you’re able to search any username and word(s) and any tweets made that include those words will pop up. When doing a social media spring cleaning, I recommend doing this, so you can clear out anything negative or embarrassing you’ve tweeted in the past.

The best way to avoid your own online scandal is to just be aware of what you post or where you post it. Most social networking sites allow you to make your account privately, so you can manage who sees what you post. My best advice is to not post anything you wouldn’t want your grandma to see.