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Facebook to Simplify Privacy Settings

LONDON, ENGLAND - MARCH 25: In this photo illu...
Image by Getty Images via @daylife

It appears that the world’s most popular social-networking site, Facebook, has finally bowed to pressure concerning its privacy settings. Facebook has announced that starting from 26 May 2010, a new set of privacy settings will be gradually unveiled in a bid to make control a lot easier for users. This follows feedback and criticism from some profile owners that Facebook privacy settings are usually over-crowded and too difficult to understand with over 50 different settings and 170 options.

The new settings will aim to provide; a single control for content, more powerful controls for basic information and an easy control to turn off all applications. Therefore, users will be able to set who (friends only, friends of friends or everyone) can see the content of their post in a couple of clicks. In addition, your list of friends will no longer be available to everyone by default – users can now control who can see their friends and pages. Finally, users can also control whether applications and websites can access any of their information including applications and games. While these partners can still see information set to “everyone”, this feature can also be completely turned off.

Meanwhile the profile picture, name, networks and gender will remain publicly available by default so as to make it easy for users to find each other. The changes will be rolled out over the next few weeks and you can take a look at the new privacy page here, which explains in detail how the new settings will work.

Talking Point

If you were in a position to make changes on behalf of Facebook, what would be your ideal privacy settings?

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13 Comments

13 Comments

  1. Pingback: Tweets that mention Facebook to Simplify Privacy Settings

  2. JCO

    May 27, 2010 at 4:22 am

    This was mentioned in Criminal Minds recently. I’m just not sure though if it is true that with this security update all profiles in Facebook will become public unless the user will set his or her own preferences after the update.
    .-= JCO´s last blog ..Google invades TV with Google TV =-.

  3. eGrove Systems

    May 27, 2010 at 11:46 am

    Ya i agree with that, I too feel facebook is not have much more privacy setting. They concern users privacy settings na it will give more useful for users.
    .-= eGrove Systems´s last blog ..Home =-.

  4. windows 7 training

    May 27, 2010 at 1:59 pm

    yeah, i also agree for that, theres a lot of scam on Facebook, specially people who are using pictures of other.

  5. Robert

    May 27, 2010 at 2:51 pm

    well, i think this is long overdue, facebook has done some great things, but this is an issue they have danced around. it is good that they are finally going to face it.

  6. NJ SEO Company

    May 27, 2010 at 3:17 pm

    When I saw the pic of the eyeball, I though they were implementing iris scanning technology. LOL. I guess they are not going that far with security…yet

  7. Admin

    May 28, 2010 at 10:35 am

    I wonder how that (iris) technology would work lol. Some security experts are now saying that these steps are not enough. It does appear however, that the reason a lot of people use Facebook is to ‘show-off’ to their friends. Thus, those group of users may not be too bothered about privacy. Do you agree?

    • Domain name registration

      May 28, 2010 at 5:28 pm

      …yes, I agree you completely, most of the users of Facebook are for show off and this people did not bothered on any privacy setting or whatsoever…

    • NJ SEO Company

      May 28, 2010 at 6:07 pm

      I totally agree that most people on Facebook do not care or ever will about privacy. On the contrary, they want everyone to see everything about them. I thought that was the purpose of Facebook anyway.

      When their boss sees them doing something against company policy is when they start worrying about privacy.

  8. Domain name registration

    May 28, 2010 at 5:34 pm

    It is long over due, and I think the have lost lots of important personal to the privacy setting issue.

  9. UK web directory submission

    May 31, 2010 at 12:23 pm

    This is a welcome development, II hope some of the people that leave Facebook because of privacy setting we come back.
    .-= UK web directory submission´s last blog ..Aliva Web Directory – Free Internet directory =-.

  10. Admin

    June 4, 2010 at 3:27 pm

    Have you tried the new settings yet? It does look much simpler to understand although critics still maintain that it is not simplified enough.

    Don’t you think that the general idea behind Facebook is ‘sharing’ and if regulations are stricter its purpose would be defeated?

  11. cadudu

    July 9, 2010 at 4:57 am

    Thanks for your great article, hope we can be good friends!

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