Facebook lovers out there may have noticed that when you logged into Facebook today you were prompted with a message that pretty much forced you to reevaluate your Facebook privacy settings.
So what hast Facebook done and how does it affect you? This is what it does according to them:
“Facebook’s new, simplified privacy settings give you more control over the information you share.”
Many of you probably remember the fiasco that took place about a year ago when Facebook changed their privacy policy and terms of service and everyone went crazy against the company. The whole community was actively talking about moving off of the platform when they announced, through an update to their terms of service, that they owned all of the content that the users put on their system.
Since then Mark and the Facebook crew have been taking many more precautions to make sure that change like this goes as smoothly as possible.
Now if you are looking at these to help you protect your personal brand you have to consider the following:
- How visible do you want to be online?
- What do you currently use your Facebook account for?
- How much information are you comfortable disclosing to the world?
My suggestions are as follows:
- Only let people you know see your contact information such as email, phone number and most importantly address.
- Displaying work information to everyone may not be a bad choice as coworkers can find you and anyone that is interested in talking to the company can also find you.
- Photos – I would restrict these. Many people don’t have photos on Facebook that they want an employer seeing. Keep these personal as they are probably focused on your personal life.
A couple other changes and things you should note:
- You now have to enter a pass word when trying to edit your privacy settings (as if you aren’t already logged in).
- You can still set custom permissions for individuals or groups of people.
- They have a new user interface for editing the permissions of albums which is pretty slick.
- Preview my profile: take a moment to click on the preview my profile while you are in the privacy settings. You can type in a person’s name to see how that person sees your profile. It is a really great feature.
You want to make sure that you set your privacy settings at a level that you are comfortable with. Always remember that displaying personal information to the world can be dangerous. Privacy is of growing importance in today’s digital age and you don’t want to put yourself at risk in any way.
I am interested in hearing what others think about Facebook’s new approach to privacy settings. Are these more or less confusing and how do you think privacy settings should be set?
Also – feel free to friend me on Facebook! Look up RJ Sherman on Facebook.com and look for my shining face! I am part of the Syracuse and Brand-Yourself.Com network.
