Privacy on Facebook – Personal Information, News Feed & Wall

I’m currently on vacation until August 3rd.  This post has been auto-published for your enjoyment! 

A continuation of last week’s post about privacy for your personal Facebook profile.

Personal Information

Click Settings >> Privacy Settings >> Profile

On this page, I’ve just got everything set to “Friends Only”.  If you have someone that you mercy-Friended (come on, we’ve all got at least one), you can choose “customize” from any drop-down menu and set it so they will remain your Friend but cannot see certain information about you.

Make sure you click the “Contact” tab and adjust the settings there as well.  This controls who can see your e-mail, phone number and IM programs IDs.

Remember to Save Changes!

 

News Feed & Wall

Click Settings >> Privacy Settings >> News Feed & Wall

Did you know that every time you write something on a Friend’s Wall (not a private message that goes to the Inbox), that something is also broadcast to all your mutual Friends via the News Feed?  If you want to prevent that, make sure the “Show Wall Posts” box is unchecked.

You can check/uncheck the rest of the boxes to your own preferences.  Remember, this won’t stop someone being able to view your Wall and see the activity, it just prevents the activity from being broadcasted to everyone New’s Feeds/Home Page.

Save the changes, of course.

 

While you are under Newsfeed & Wall, you will want to click the tab “Facebook Ads”.  In the drop-down list, select “No One”.  What is this all about?  You know how you see ads when you are browsing Facebook, and those ads sometimes contain images of your Friends? (Does “Susie thinks you’re an idiot!  Can you beat her IQ?” sound familiar?)  Guess what.  Your picture and name has been showing up in the ads that your friends see!  By changing this selection to “no one”, you can stop having your profile picture appear in advertisements.