Lifehacker - Your Deleted Social Network Pics Are Probably Still There

Tech site Ars Technica saw a university study reporting that photos and other images posted by Facebook, MySpace, and other social network users are often left on those services’ servers long after the posters hit “delete.” They put that finding to the test. Images posted to Flickr and Twitter were immediately gone upon refreshing, but images could still be found on Facebook and MySpace’s servers two months later, with both companies saying the issue was one of third-party server response. Anyone who can grab a direct link, in other words, can get at your stuff long after you want it gone. Need some web reputation triage? Break out the web Band-Aids and get to managing your online reputation.

via Lifehacker - Your Deleted Social Network Pics Are Probably Still There - Facebook.

A lot of people, including myself, often overlook the importance of managing their online identity.  A friend teaching school thought no one would ever find his blog, as he blogged anonymously, but it ended up being the second search result for his name in Google.

I have an obvious web presence tracking spots across various sites I’ve registered for at some time or another.  With a little bit of work, you could probably even track down those sites that don’t personally identify me as I haven’t historically been very careful in keeping my handles private.  It’s a shame, since, once they’re out there, there’s not too much you can do to prevent a persistent person from finding you.  For example, that same friend’s web site from high school on an ISP long gone is still available via the web archive.

So, I’ve settled with the goal of simply not making my associations too obvious– I don’t link my various blogs one to the other.