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3 Ways Social Media Can Influence Your Personal Injury Claim

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Social media serves many purposes today. It helps you stay connected to the issues and people that you care most about. It helps you create professional and personal opportunities in your life by allowing you to network with other individuals and organizations. It also helps you distract yourself from the variety of pressures that you are facing in your day-to-day life. However, despite all the advantages to social media, there are also disadvantages -- especially when it comes to a personal injury lawsuit. Here are three ways that social media can negatively impact your claim:

Social Media Can Question the Extent of Your Injury

Opposing legal counsel and insurance companies will do whatever is in their power to deny your personal injury claim. In many cases, this will consist of combing through every single one of your social media accounts. For example, if you insist that you injured your back in an auto collision but you posted photos on your Facebook account of you and your friends playing miniature golf the next day, questions will likely arise about the validity of your injury claim.  

Social Media Can Disclose Private, Confidential Information

Any information that you disclose to your attorney is confidential and privileged information. The last thing that you want to do is to jeopardize the sacredness of your attorney-client relationship or your personal injury case, which means that you may need to resist the urge to post private details regarding your personal injury or case on your public Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other social media accounts. Keep in mind that anything that is posted publicly on your accounts is a matter of public record, and anyone that sees it -- such as the opposing counsel -- can use it against you for the sake of the case.

Social Media Can Undermine Your Personal Injury Case

While you may feel as if you need to share your personal account of the accident, you do not need to do so on your public social media account because this could ultimately undermine your personal injury case -- something that you definitely do not want to do. For instance, you could post what happened and a friend could comment on your post saying that they hope you're okay. In response, not thinking, you could let them know that you are fine or offer a response that is similar. While this type of reply seems innocent to you, you may derail your day in court.

As you can see, it is always better to stay off of social media and be silent. For more information, talk to a personal injury lawyer in your area.


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