I received a message on Facebook from a friend who said that they received the following message… “One of my friends just sent me a screen shot of something on Facebook and she’s asking of the authenticity. Do you know if what they say is true about all our photos and info being visible to everyone for the next two weeks?” Here is what she saw:
First of all, this is probably a hoax going around on Facebook, as a message. But there still are real concerns about our privacy on Facebook because many do not apply the proper privacy settings in the first place. Case in point, many of my social media workshop participants had their privacy settings set to “Public” in the first place. This meant that anyone could view their personal information. To me, this is the greater concern than the above message going around.
And with the example above, we need to realize that we are in control of our information and pictures on Facebook for the most part. We need to set privacy settings that we are comfortable with. On another note, it’s wise to remember that once a picture is on the Internet, it is there for good. And for those who can view our pictures, they need to respect the level of privacy we have set and not share them beyond that level.
In summary – Yes, we do need to lock our Facebook privacy setting down better. No, we do not need to panic. And just for you, I am going to show you how you can do it in plain and simple terms.
There are a few areas we will visit to check and change our settings if needed:
- Update Info area that contains information About Us.
- Our Friends List area
- Our Pictures and Albums
- Our “Likes” area
- Our Movie and Reading area, etc
Here’s a run through video to high light what needs to be done:
When it comes to your photos, you should be able to set some albums to the appropriate privacy level by clicking on the globe just below and to the right of the album title. If you are unable to do this, you will have to go through your pictures one at a time to set each individual privacy setting. I know it’s going to be a pain in the butt. If you want your photos to be private, you are going to have to set them so by whatever means possible.
Make sure you go through all the sections of your Facebook Profile and set the Privacy Settings to the level you are comfortable with. Don’t forget to set the tagging options as well. If you have any questions, please ask.
