A post on social media can be made in a matter of seconds, even while sitting in a restaurant booth. If you are currently involved in a personal injury lawsuit or other type of legal dispute, a routine status update might be examined along with your doctor’s notes, timesheets, or your boss’ emails. That coffee stain on the side of your mug may not be relevant; however, that grin, the location tag, and the brief caption may be scrutinized closely, especially if the ache, exhaustion, and aggravation that prompted the injury is out of frame.

The Grin on a Rough Day

You are at your nephew’s birthday party, working through the pain of a sprained shoulder. A family member snaps a picture as the candles are tilted over the icing, and you pose for a quick snapshot. What is captured in that shot is a paper crown and one good moment. It does not depict the bag of ice in the backseat, the slow motion of dressing yourself, or the quick departure from the party.

If that photo is viewed by a claims adjuster, an employer, or defense counsel, they will have no way of knowing what happened before or after that snapshot was taken. A caption saying “What a great day!” will seem incongruous with descriptions of severe pain. While this won’t necessarily be the deciding factor in your lawsuit, it can raise questions which must then be addressed through further documentation and testimony.

When You’re Tagged Without Posting

You may not post yourself, but you may still be tagged online. Someone may tag you in a concert photo where a stool is placed nearby; someone else might include your name on a hiking club post; or maybe you’ve been checked-in at a loud diner with a door that squeaks. Even if your privacy settings restrict the visibility, which is explained well at https://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki, of your activity to only friends, screenshots and forwarded posts can go much farther than intended.

Checking your tagging and approval options can help prevent unwanted posts. Also, make sure to ask your friends and family members not to mention your situation, your work, your injury, or your lawsuit online. Keep it simple, as sending a text blast to your entire list detailing every aspect of your legal trouble may generate another piece of documentation that needs to be reviewed.

Work Notifications Can Cause Confusion

When your lawsuit involves a disagreement at work, there may be some potentially confusing activities online. A status update reading “Looking for work” might confuse people. An announcement that you’ve gotten an interview, taken from a picture taken beside a dent in the lobby’s water cooler, could also be misinterpreted. You might vent about your ex-boss, and again, this might raise questions.

Any modifications you make may also be significant. You may change your position title, remove a current employer, or alter the dates you worked there once you’ve initiated a dispute. Before making changes to your professional page, you should Consult with Vito & Dollenmaier to determine which parts of your profile should stay public, and how to update any information which must be updated.

Angry Texts May Not Disappear

A snide message written at your kitchen table may look different the next day, especially when the cold coffee and the angry emoji are stored in a screenshot. Posts claiming that the other side is lying, ridiculing a witness, or discussing confidential settlement talks could lead to additional complications in negotiations and preparation.

You should avoid posting anything negative about the dispute in the comments section of social media platforms, in private groups, in direct messaging services, or in apps that use disappearing text. Even if something is deemed to be “private,” it can still be screenshotted, forwarded, subpoenaed, or otherwise recovered (try this website).

Be Careful With Existing Posts

Don’t go through your previous posts frantically hitting the delete key. Deleting, modifying, hiding, or attempting to obscure relevant documents following a lawsuit has been known to cause problems with the issue of preservation of evidence.

• Refrain from posting anything related to your injury, work, travel, physical activities, and doctor visits.
• Store texts, images, captions, and account details as advised by your lawyer.
• Flag any posts or contacts you weren’t expecting; don’t engage with them in the comments section.
• Consult an attorney before altering privacy settings or scrubbing an old profile clean.

Don’t overlook connected apps either. A fitness app might show activity patterns; a photo backup might give you the date when you took certain photos; your map history could show that you were in town on a certain day. Talk with your attorney about how to preserve data from these connected services prior to deactivating or disabling an account, or disabling syncing.

Going Forward

A snapshot of yourself with a birthday cake, or a short update about your job, may need more context than the internet can give. Speak with an attorney about preserving important documents and managing your online presence during your legal dispute. Until then, don’t delete, modify, or hide evidence, and let that blinking cursor linger for a bit.