In today’s digital age, we all have what’s called a digital footprint — information in the cyber world about who we are. It includes where we live, who our relatives are, where we work, what we earn, what we buy and it goes on and on.

“All that information is available and it’s out there permanently,” said Eugene Spafford, a computer sciences professor at Purdue University and executive director of the Center for Education and Research in Information Assurance and Security. “Once it gets out, there’s really no way to call it back.”