Reputation management has now become a defining feature of online life for many internet users, especially the young. While some internet users are careful to project themselves online in a way that suits specific audiences, other internet users embrace an open approach to sharing information about themselves and do not take steps to restrict what they share.

A new report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that 57% of adults have used search engines to find information about themselves online. This is an increment of 10% back in 2006. On top of that, 71% of social networking users 18-29 have changed their profile privacy settings.

This is a result of a survey conducted over 2,253 American adults over the age of 18 on their internet behaviours between August and September of last year. One of the findings suggest that users increasingly change privacy settings, delete comments and untagging themselves in photos, but overall the online population worries 7% less about how much information is available about itself than it did in 2006.

According to Pew, the young adult demographic is the most privacy-conscious: 44% of 18-29 year-olds have made efforts to limit the personal information they share online, 47% of the same group have deleted comments on their profile and 41% have removed their name from photos they were tagged in. Plus, 28% of these same young adults say that they can “never” trust social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn.

On the other hand, the older demographics is less privacy-conscious. Amongst the social networking adults aged 50 to 64, only 55% have changed their default privacy settings, and only 20% of seniors 65 and older have actively limited the personal information they post online.

From the looks of this survey, we can safely say that young adults are becoming more aware about the information they post online, and the implications that content may have on their personal and professional lives.

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