Facebook has rolled out a new update to its security settings. Have you got the new
settings yet? Well you will know because you have a new icon on the top right of your page – looks like a padlock. I’ll give you a quick run down of the security settings you should review.
1. Clicking on the padlock icon will immediately give you access to three options:
- Who can see my stuff
- Who can contact me
- How do I stop someone from bothering me.
There is nothing new here – these options were all available before – but they are more visible and easier to understand now.
If you are using Facebook for business, you may want to set your settings to be more open than if you are keeping the profile private for personal use. Do remember though that even if you share a photo with just your friends there is nothing to stop your friends sharing the photo publicly so do be careful what you share!
If you look at your Activity log, you can see everything you have done on Facebook and choose what is public / visible to friends / private.
2. Clicking on the gear on the top right hand corner and then selecting Privacy Settings brings up further options:
- Who can see your future posts
- Review all your posts and things you are tagged in
- Limit the audience for posts you’ve shared with friends of friends or public
- Who can look you up using the email address or phone number you provided
- Do you want other search engines to link to your timeline
The main things you should look at here are “limit the audience” – check your really old posts to see whether they are still appropriate to be publicly visible! and “do you want other search engines….”. If you are trying to keep your profile private, I would turn this off – my children are turning this off for example.
3. From here click the Timeline and Tagging option on the left hand side.
This section looks at what content others can post on your timeline and whether you want to review posts you have been mentioned (tagged in). Read these settings carefully – I think some are counter intuitive.
The new settings are, in general, easier to understand – but I would recommend that you really think about how you want to use your Facebook personal profile and why you have chosen a particular security setting.
What do you think – are the new settings easier to understand?