Alert: 5 Things you should know about your facebook privacy settings!!!

This one is for all of my social networkers. A little over a month ago the powers over at Facebook decided to change a few key things about their privacy settings. According to Facebook's guide to privacy, the changes mean:

• You can now control who can see every post you share, from status updates to photo albums.
• Regional networks (like London or Australia) have been removed.
• A common set of information for all users is now publicly available.
• Facebook-enhanced applications and websites now have access to a limited set of information when you use and interact with them: your publicly available information and information you've made visible to Everyone.
• No changes whatsoever to ads on Facebook. We do not give—and have never given—anyone's data or personally identifiable information to advertisers.

Although the changes were supposed to be user friendly, I was only able to figure out the new layout a few days ago. Based on my experience with securing my profile and the information contained therein, here is my list of the things you should check (and possibly change) in your privacy settings.

1. Public search listing: Before the switch, I had this feature turned OFF but after a quick google of myself I quickly discovered that this feature had been turned ON without any sort of notification to me. To check this setting, log on to your account and click on Settings>Privacy Settings>Search. If the "Allow indexing" box is checked next to "Public Search Listing" then search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing will be able to index your information. 24 hours after you change this, type your name into any search engine and verify that the public search listing has been deleted. If it has not, double check that the"allow indexing" box is unchecked and then post your question under the "help" option.

2. Publicly available information. This is the information that is available to members of a group, quiz developers or fan page you may be a member of. Even if your Facebook profile is "private," when you take a quiz, an unknown quiz developer could be accessing almost everything in your profile: your religion, sexual orientation, political affiliation, pictures, and groups. Facebook quizzes also have access to most of the info on your friends' profiles. This means that if your friend takes a quiz, they could be giving away your personal information too. The ACLU has created a quiz called "What do Quizzes really know about you?" which will give you a shocking idea of what info is shared about you when you take a quiz. It may make you think twice the next time you feel compelled to answer questions to find out "what kind of girlfriend are you?" or "which boondocks character are you?"

3. Privacy lists. These can be useful when you want to publish information but only allow certain people the privilege of viewing it. With the new changes, You can select a privacy level or choose to customize your privacy. You can easily create Friend Lists from the Friends page and selecting "Custom Setting" any time you set your privacy. This will allow you the opportunity to restrict the information for the intended viewers.


4. Friends lists: You can restrict who sees your friends lists. If you want to restrict who sees your friends list within Facebook, click on the pencil icon next to your Friends widget below your profile picture, and uncheck the box that says "Show my friends on my profile." While you're at it, you may choose to make your gender and yoru current city invisible as well


5. Be careful what you post. As an avid user of social networking sites, I can relate to one's concern about their privacy on the internet. However, I encourage all of you to avoid things that you would rather not share with the world because you never know who may see you or when a hidden camera may just be filming you. Use online communities sparingly and with care. Be honest, polite and meet new people while putting your best (digital) foot forward. Once you post something, you can never truly delete it. Think twice before you post an angry status update about your spouse or family members because the memory of those words will linger long after you have deleted the post.

You can read Facebook's privacy policy here.

Are you concerned about your privacy on facebook? Were these tips helpful for you? Did we miss an important tip? Drop your thoughts and feedback off in the comments area.

Image source: Google