5 Critical Facebook Privacy Tips You Need to Know

Maintaining Your Facebook Privacy: A Comprehensive Guide

MakeUseOf has consistently provided extensive coverage of Facebook’s privacy and security configurations. Facebook frequently revises its privacy settings and available options.

This article consolidates insights from prior reports, offering updated guidance to align with the platform’s current features.

Understanding Facebook's Evolving Privacy Landscape

Keeping abreast of Facebook’s changes can be challenging. If you’re unsure of your current privacy status, this is an ideal opportunity to review and optimize your settings.

The following tips will help you regain control over your information and enhance your overall Facebook experience.

Key Areas to Review

Profile Visibility: Control who can see your posts and profile information.
Post Privacy: Adjust the audience for each individual post.
Tagging Settings: Manage how you are tagged in photos and posts.
App Permissions: Review and limit the data shared with third-party applications.

Regularly checking these areas is crucial for maintaining a desired level of privacy on Facebook.

Facebook’s dynamic nature necessitates periodic reviews of your privacy configurations to ensure they continue to reflect your preferences.

Managing Your Facebook Profile Privacy

Your Facebook profile holds a wealth of personal data, encompassing details about you, your connections, your educational background, and your professional life. Facebook provides granular control over the visibility of this information through its privacy settings.

Let's explore how to adjust the settings for your Basic Information. This will allow you to determine who can view key aspects of your profile.

Adjusting Basic Information Visibility

You can access these settings directly through this link while logged into Facebook.
Alternatively, navigate to your Facebook profile and click the Edit Profile button located in the upper right corner.
For each item within your profile, locate the small icon to the right and use it to define the audience who can view that specific piece of information.
Continue this process for all entries and sections throughout your entire profile.

This ensures a consistent level of privacy across all your displayed data.

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Important Note: To preview how your profile appears to different audiences, such as the public or your friends, utilize the View As feature available on your profile page. This functionality allows for a direct assessment of your privacy configurations.

This tip draws inspiration from Angela's 2011 guidance on controlling privacy within the Facebook Timeline.

Categorizing Connections with Facebook Lists

Maintaining your privacy on Facebook can be effectively achieved by organizing your connections into distinct lists. This is particularly useful when individuals like extended family or professional contacts request friendship. The following outlines the process of establishing and utilizing these lists for refined privacy controls.

Access list creation either through this direct link while logged into your Facebook account, or...
...by navigating to the Friends section within your Facebook profile's sidebar.
Within the friends overview, select the Friends button adjacent to a contact's name. Scroll down the menu options and choose Create New List....
Establish as many lists as are necessary to categorize your connections appropriately. It's important to remember that your friend network will not have visibility into the lists you create.
Subsequently, assign your friends to the relevant lists.

The concept behind this technique draws inspiration from an article authored by Mahendra in 2009, titled "10 Solid Tips to Safeguard Your Facebook Privacy."

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Utilizing Facebook lists allows for granular control over the content shared with different groups. This ensures that personal updates are seen by close friends, while professional interactions remain separate.

Benefits of Using Facebook Lists

Employing Facebook lists offers several advantages for users concerned with their online privacy. These include the ability to tailor content visibility and manage interactions with different segments of your network.

Selective Sharing: Share specific posts with only certain lists, preventing unwanted audiences from viewing sensitive information.
Enhanced Privacy: Limit the information accessible to extended family or colleagues.
Organized Network: Easily manage and identify different groups within your friend network.

By strategically implementing Facebook lists, users can significantly enhance their privacy and control over their online presence.

Managing Your Facebook Connection Preferences

The How You Connect privacy features on Facebook empower you to regulate who can locate your profile, send you friend requests, contribute to your timeline, or see your publicly shared content. Consider your Facebook password as the primary security for your account; these settings function as the additional layers of control over your visibility.

Access these settings directly through this link while logged into your Facebook account, or...
...navigate to the small arrow icon located in the upper-right corner of your Facebook profile and select Privacy Settings.
Within the Privacy Settings, locate and click Edit Settings adjacent to the How You Connect option.
Utilize the drop-down menus provided next to each setting to choose the appropriate audience for each item. You can choose from pre-defined options or utilize your own custom friend lists.

The image below illustrates my personal configuration. I, for instance, prefer to limit posts directly on my timeline. It is also possible to restrict visibility of posts made by others to only yourself.

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Adjusting Your Facebook Privacy Preferences

A default privacy setting can be established for all posts made to your Facebook wall. This preventative measure ensures that sensitive information intended for a limited audience isn't inadvertently shared publicly.

The following steps outline how to configure this setting:

Navigate to your Facebook Privacy Settings.
Within the Control your Default Privacy section, choose either Friends or Custom.

Selecting Custom grants you the most granular control over who can view your updates.

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With the Custom option, you can designate specific individuals or pre-defined lists to whom your updates will be visible, or conversely, hidden by default.

To further enhance your privacy, it is recommended to deselect the Friends of those tagged option.

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Managing Your Facebook Ad Privacy

Have you observed that Facebook displays endorsements from your connections? These are known as social ads, and it’s likely your own likes are visible to your friends as well. A complete avoidance of liking any content is one solution. Alternatively, you can disable these social advertisements.

Begin the process while actively logged into your Facebook account, or...
Navigate to your Account Settings and choose Facebook Ads from the left-hand menu.
Select Edit third party ad settings and/or Edit social ads setting.
From the drop-down menu, choose No one, then confirm your changes by clicking Save Changes.

This adjustment prevents your interactions from being used in ads targeted towards your friends.

Further resources are available to enhance your Facebook privacy. Consider exploring these:

The Top 5 Privacy Tips For Facebook Timeline Applications
Concerned About Privacy? Opt Out Of Facebook App Permissions With fPrivacy [Chrome]
6 Simple Tips To Protect Your Privacy on Facebook
Facebook Really Needs More Sophisticated Privacy Controls [Opinion]
How To Tweak Important Privacy Settings For Limited-Access Facebook Pages

What strategies do you employ to safeguard your privacy on Facebook? Share your insights with us!