Computerworld reports that one in five companies search social networking sites during the hiring process, although many experts believe that number is much higher. You may think that you’re immune because you don’t have any MySpace, Twitter or Facebook accounts- but read on and you will find that is far from the truth.

• Do a search on yourself. Try Google and Pipl. Search for the same items that appear on your resume and application- name, addresses, phone numbers, user names, email accounts and professional groups are all gateways to finding your profile

• Be aware of professional name squatting and company squatting. There are those who scoop up usernames and create profiles using professional information belonging to you. You can usually get access to these profiles, but at a cost. You do not have to buy the impostor login from the squatter, but be aware that if you found it while searching for information about you, your employer will see it too. There are plenty of online reputation management companies that will help you change the order of appearance of your legitimate profiles in search rankings, and even some that will help you reserve your name and user profile on multiple social networking sites for a small fee. Others still will help you create positive chatter to help drown out any negative or misleading pages.

• Even if you delete the profile, page or photos they may not be gone. Internet archives are still searchable. Photos can be especially difficult to delete entirely.

• Who you keep company with says a lot about you. Your profile might be clean and professional, but if your buddy has pictures of the two of you on your last pub crawl, it can damage your chances of landing the job. Use the privacy settings on your profiles wisely!

• Many people are transitioning between being laid off and job searching maybe angry about the economy and the way they were shown the door. Keep a lid on negative comments about your former employer, just as you would during an interview.

• Be careful of professional identity thieves. I don’t mean people who steal identities for a living, I mean people who troll profiles like LinkedIn to create fake resumes to get hired at companies using real information from other people. The more personal information available on your profiles and resumes the easier it will be for a person to commit identity theft, professional identity theft or gain access to your online profiles by correcting guessing your secret questions. Consider removing details like the names of companies, schools and organizations as well as dates and addresses. Change your profiles slightly to use generic terms such as “Privacy officer for major health organization in Silicon Valley” instead.

• Social networking has become popular way to search for jobs as well. There are classifieds on MySpace, and the ever popular Craigslist- but these are often full of scammers lurking in wait. Offers that sound too good to be true probably are. Stay aware from offers that involve wiring money, processing money orders or otherwise acting as a “broker” for transferring funds. Check the company out using Better Business Bureau, your local police, or other methods before proving any personal information such as date of birth, social security number or showing up for an interview

• If you are offering your services, be careful of people who may be looking for an excuse to come to your home to “case” it for a robbery later. Also watch out for offers to pay you more than what you asked.  You may cash the check, but once the bank processes the phony funds, you will be left holding the bag. Be careful in responding to emails about your job posting as they may be from bots used by spammers or scammers trying to verify that there is a person on the other end of the email.

Bottom line: beware of what you post, delete does not always mean gone forever, use your privacy settings, and be aware of intential and unintential impostors. The last is a warning for both employers and employees. This is why it is so important to know what comes up out there under your name and details- if there is a person sharing your name, area, and has a similar address you may want to directly address that issue in a cover letter or interview. Don’t worry about bringing it up- It shows that you care about your reputation, and that you’re tech saavy.