Social media can be a treasure trove of information for an attorney (see our post Who’s Profile Is this Anyway? - Using Social Media In Litigation from July 20, 2011). However, to the individual, who finds himself or herself in a lawsuit, everything on social media can be used against you. What should individuals do to protect their information from opponents in court? Read this article for some quick tips.

            It is becoming more and more common that sites and applications have options to automatically share information with everyone on Facebook. This automatic action is called “frictionless” social media, where the individual takes no action to post the information. In some cases, these posts can be damaging to the person posting them. For individuals, it is important to know whether any frictionless social media is occurring on your account. For example, a defendant in a murder case would not want a frictionless post showing that they are reading articles about insanity defenses, or disposing of bodies. Or imagine you are in a divorce case where adultery is alleged and you see that the other spouse just checked into a hotel, or went on an expensive trip. In both of these examples, the information could be used against the person posting the information.

            As an individual, the key to protecting yourself is to know what is being posted to your account. Here are the four areas of concern:

1) what you have actively posted,

2) your settings for “frictionless” posting,

3) your privacy settings and who can see your posts, and

4) what others are posting about you on your pages.

Remember once information is posted, it can’t always be taken down. By the time an individual hires an attorney, it is normally too late to control the social media in existence. If the information is removed from social media after a lawsuit is filed, it could result in penalties to both the individual and the attorney. Therefore, before you click “Send”, “Post”, “Tweet” or “Like” make sure you would be willing to see that information brought up in future litigation.