Traces of Criminal Records: Digital Reputation and Information Concealment Policy

Vollständiger Abstract

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ABSTRACT In the United States, a robust data ecosystem aggregates and shares public records about people that may ultimately appear in Internet search results for a person's name. These records can include stigmatizing information and operate outside public policy efforts to conceal negative information from regulated background screening processes. Our study assesses the Internet search results of 225 people who have been charged or convicted of crime to identify patterns for what types of records appear online and for whom. We find that approximately 1 in 5 people in the sample have criminal records on the Internet, which varies by jurisdiction, time since arrest, and severity of offense. We further examine whether being eligible for different types of record “remediation” policies impacts informal Internet search results. We identify 173 people who benefited from criminal record remediation (67 had their entire record sealed). Internet search results for crime information appear even for those with partial remediation (27.4%–42.5%) or fully sealed records (10.4%–20.9%). Our findings point to how a varied informational policy landscape in the United States contributes to the continued existence of public criminal stigma, even amidst efforts to conceal such information from specific contexts.