Post a photo of your new front door and you've published your street, your house number, the fact you've just moved in, and, depending on the light, a decent guess at when you're not home.
Nobody posts that on purpose. It comes out sideways, across dozens of ordinary updates that are individually harmless and collectively a profile. Your employer from one post, your children's school from another, your birthday from the annual round of messages, your routine from the timing of everything.
That's the raw material for a convincing scam call, and it's the reason a stranger can sound like they know you. The fix isn't leaving social media. It's deciding what's on show.
What you get
The overshare activity. An ordinary post pulled apart to show precisely what it hands over. This is the part people find genuinely startling, because the post always looks fine until it's annotated.
The audience ladder. From specific named people at the safe end up to fully public at the other, which the course suggests you treat as a billboard, because that's what it is.
The Decision Matrix. What to lock down and what's perfectly fine to post, in priority order, so you're not agonising over every photograph.
Clarity Scripts. The pre-post check, the billboard test, and running a proper privacy audit rather than a nervous scroll.
A timed action plan and six self-tests. View your own profile the way the public sees it, fix your defaults, then repeat across every account. The tests confirm the trail has actually shrunk.
This is for you if
- You want to keep using social media, not delete it in a fit of panic
- You've never looked at your profile while logged out
- You aren't sure which of your posts are public and which aren't
- You've had a message from someone who seemed to know a bit too much
- You post about your children and have started wondering what that adds up to
By the last page
Tightened settings across your main accounts, a clear instinct for what's safe to post, and a public trail that gives scammers and strangers far less to build on.
Course details
- Format: downloadable PDF
- Time to complete: 45 to 60 minutes
- Series: Course 13 of 20, GhostNet Cyber Fundamentals
- Track: Track C, Everyday Digital Safety (Course 3 of 5)
- Prerequisites: none, though Course 05 pairs naturally with it
- Works on: any device, any operating system
- Level: complete beginner, no technical background needed
Buy with confidence
Every course comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee. If it isn't useful, email us within 30 days and we'll refund you in full. You don't need to give a reason.
Where to go next
Course 14, Safe Online Shopping and Banking, protects the money that a well-researched scam is ultimately after. Or take Everyday Digital Safety, the five-course bundle covering Courses 11 to 15, for £100 instead of £150.
