Digital Footprints

The topic of digital footprints has been discussed for many years (Fish, 2009) “We are increasingly leaving larger digital footprints over time, especially given rise to popular social networks and mobile devices”. With the development of Web 2.0 our digital footprint has become more prominent which allows users to generate their own content. It is the trail of data that we are leaving behind when we go online, what others have said about us, where we have travelled online, images that we are tagged in, personal information we have disclosed and even our social media profiles that contribute to our lack of privacy. As stated by (Oxley, 2010) “Responsible and ethical use of the internet is not something that teenagers in particular consider to be important and serious consequences are beginning to emerge as a result of careless and offensive online behaviour”.

This gives rise to the need to educate our youth in digital citizenship and digital footprint to promote responsible behaviour with regarding the use of technology. It is with this knowledge that I have chosen to develop an elearning resource to inform young adults of the impact of their digital footprint.