Your Digital Story — Who Controls Who Tells Your Story Online?

You have a story online whether you wrote it or not. Search engines, social media, schools, news outlets (and people who share your name) all contribute. Who actually controls who tells your story? And what can you do about it?

This project trains the student to systematically investigate their own (or a consenting public figure's) digital footprint using AI, while resisting the temptation to blindly trust the machine, because when it comes to reputation, a machine's mistake is not just an error, but can become defamation.

After the project, the student can:

1. map a digital footprint systematically from multiple angles;
2. classify claims into three tiers based on strength of evidence (independently verified / self-sourced / uncertain);
3. distinguish between convergence and independent corroboration (convergence ≠ corroboration);
4. identify who controls the narrative (themselves, platforms, third parties, algorithms, or namesakes) and where data sovereignty and digital freedom can be reclaimed;
5. take responsibility for what they publish, reject, and correct.

• The Human Anchor = Baseline Audit: the student writes down who they think they are online, before searching.
• The Algorithmic Pivot = Sector analysis using the ICCRA prompt and the three-tier framework.
• The Fiduciary Anchor = Honest Oracle: the student challenges their own results, distinguishes convergence from corroboration, and shifts the responsibility back.

This connects directly to units 08 (Technology: the benevolent cage, data sovereignty), 17 (Media: source tracking) and 20 (Human Rights: systemic bias). The pack is an ideal introduction to the concepts of data sovereignty and digital freedom.

Without a machine. Write this yourself, before you search for anything. This is your benchmark: the image you will later compare with what the internet says. If you search first, you will swallow the internet's story and lose your own. 600–1,000 words.

You may research yourself or an approved public figure (e.g., a well-known artist, athlete, or politician who has chosen to be in the spotlight). You may not research schoolmates, teachers, or private individuals without explicit consent. See the code of ethics in the teacher guidelines.

Answer the following without looking anything up:

1. The Identity. Who do you think you are online? What image would you want a stranger to get if they Googled you?
2. The Prediction. What do you think actually comes up if someone searches for you now: on a search engine, on social media, in image search? Guess honestly.
3. The Authors. Who has written this story? List those who contribute: yourself, platforms (TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat…), school/clubs, media, friends and family, and possible namesakes who share your name.
4. The Control. What do you control and what do you not? What could you remove today? What is permanently held by others? What does an algorithm decide on your behalf (what appears at the top, what disappears)?
5. The Feeling. Is there anything out there you wish weren't there? Or that you wish more people saw? Why?

Conclude with one sentence: "If I were an employer, coach, or a stranger who Googled me, my first thought about me would be …"

Keep this unchanged. In Step 3, you will compare it with what the machine and the internet said, and then you will see where your own image and the digital story clash.

Now you use AI as an amplifier, not an oracle. You direct — the machine searches, summarizes, and expands. The goal is to gather everything available, but categorize it immediately based on how reliable it is.

1. The Goal: "I am going to map the digital footprint of [me / X] and analyze who controls the narrative."
2. The Prompt: you design it (template below).
3. GO: you approve the run and bear responsibility for the result.

One search term shows one side. Run the analysis from at least four angles and keep them separate:

• Search engine — what comes up first? Who owns the top results?
• Social media — public profiles, photos, traces of others talking about you.
• Academics/work/school — public pages, registries, news.
• Image search — what images are linked to the name?
• Namesakes — who else shares your name, and is there any confusion?

Do not ask the machine "who is X?" and accept the answer. Demand that it categorize every claim into one of three tiers:

Use this structure — it is designed to force categorization and resistance against sycophancy:

INTENT: Map the digital footprint of "[full name / public entity]" and analyze who
  controls the narrative. Do not draw conclusions about the person themselves.

CONTEXT: This is [myself · approved public entity]. Known facts: [school,
  location, hobbies — what you already know]. Possible namesakes: [if any].

CONSTRAINTS:
  - Categorize EVERY claim into evidence tier 1 / 2 / 3 and name the source for tier 1.
  - Distinguish consensus from verification: if multiple pages say the same thing but draw from
    the same original source, it counts as ONE source, not multiple.
  - Specifically identify what might refer to a namesake.
  - ANTISYCOPHANCY: List in a separate section everything you are UNCERTAIN about or that could be incorrect.
    Do not omit inconvenient points.

AUTHORITY: You may search widely and deepen the search yourself, but do not invent sources. If you
  cannot find verification, say so explicitly.

REPORTING: Deliver (1) a table: claim | tier | source | who published it, and
  (2) a short list of "what I am uncertain about".

A raw but categorized table of everything found, plus the "uncertain about" list. Do not interpret yet — that waits for Step 3. Remember: at this stage, the machine has gathered the story. What remains is to judge it.

The final gate. Here you prove that you can use AI without hiding behind it. You attack your own result (that is the Honest Oracle) and shift the responsibility back to a human.

Bring out Step 1. Where does the image you had of yourself clash with the story the web tells? What was surprising? What was completely missing?

Be your own harshest critic. Answer:

• Convergence ≠ corroboration: Which "facts" that looked like they were corroborated multiple times actually turned out to originate from one source (usually your own profile)? Re-label them as Level 2.
• Hallucination: Did the machine invent something (an award, an event, a job, a connection) that you cannot verify? Reputation cannot tolerate hallucination: a false claim about a person can become defamation.
• Name confusion: Did the machine mix you up with a namesake? What was wrongly attributed to you?

Fill out for each important item: who published it and who controls it:

Draw a conclusion: do you control the narrative about yourself, or do platforms, algorithms, and others do it for you?

List realistic actions, distinguishing between two things:

• Data sovereignty (where your data lives and who controls it): what can you remove, make private, host yourself, or ask to have deleted?
• Digital freedom (choice of tools and behavior): which platforms do you choose, what do you stop feeding, what story do you start writing yourself (e.g., your own site that you own)?

Name at least two items from the AI output that you reject. Explain whether they were incorrect, unproven, based on name confusion, or simply not in line with reality.

Conclude in the first person: what you take responsibility for as correct, what you do not know yet, and what single step you will take to reclaim control over the story about you.