Posts tagged as:

privacy settings

Timeline Apps: Quick Guide To Manage Them

January 26, 2012

Facebook’s announcement regarding making Timeline mandatory might leave quite a lot of users unhappy.
But, that’s what all major Facebook update has gone through. And like it or not, Timeline is here to stay.

For Facebook, it’s a thing of the past and has gone ahead with launching 60 Timeline apps few days back, with the hope that its users will spend more time on the site through these apps.

Timeline apps, on one hand, will make it easier for users to keep tab of things they like without leaving the site. Once you install an app, all activities associated with that app will be neatly grouped into a small box on your Timeline. With the old profile, activity feeds of an app use to litter your wall with each individual action you take on a third-party site. But on the other hand, users will experience an influx of over-sharing with feeds from these apps on their Timeline, ticker, and News Feed.

There are about 80 Timeline apps available on Facebook’s Timeline Apps information page, divided into 9 categories that include Entertainment, Fitness, Food, Giving, Music, News, Shopping and Fashion, Travel, and Others. One can expects thousands more in the near future.

You too, will be using quite a few in a short period of time. So, here are few things that you can do to make the best use of Timeline apps and make the experience worthwhile.

1. Before you download the app, choose a setting for the app by going through the option “Who can see activity from this app on Facebook.” Note that your default privacy settings will kick in automatically for all your applications, unless you change it.

2. Be sure to broadcast your activities of an app only with those who have similar interest. Choosing the “Only Me” option will limit your activity feeds on your Timeline only, and it will only be visible to you.

3. You can always go back and review or change your preferences from your Privacy Settings Page.

You will see all the apps you have installed and the permissions associated with them by going through: Privacy Settings -> Edit Settings (next to Apps and Websites) -> Edit Settings (next to Apps you use).

Here, you can remove apps you don’t like/use. Review the permissions granted to them, and remove certain permission. Some permission is mandatory, as they are required for the app to work correctly.

4. Last but not the least, you should remember that your friends and people you share your information with can also share your activity with apps they use.

If you don’t want people sharing your app activity, go through: Privacy Settings -> Settings (next to Apps and Websites) -> Edit settings (next to How People bring your info to apps they use) -> uncheck the box next to “My app activity” on the dialog that pops up.

Remember that Facebook is about connecting, sharing, and discovering. Don’t do it in a way that risks your privacy or your online connection.

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Facebook Brings Privacy Options To Its Mobile Users

August 5, 2010

Facebook announced in their blog that they have enabled a mobile version of its privacy dashboard for users of its mobile site m.facebook.com.

“As mobile devices have become more sophisticated and widespread, we’ve noticed that people are creating content and accessing Facebook at every moment of the day, in many locations—not just from desktops,” wrote Michael Eyal Sharon, mobile product manager at Facebook.

More than 150 million actively uses Facebook through mobile devices, often engaged in updating their status, and uploading photos and videos.

Now, you can make real time decision over who get a taste of every bit of information that you shared on Facebook.

Users can can take charge of their privacy controls, either by going to m.facebook.com/privacy or by going to the ‘Settings’ page and clicking the “Change” link available next to “Privacy Settings.”

Once inside the ‘Privacy Settings’ page, you can select who see the content you post, customize your granular settings, and also edit/customize Block Lists, Public Search, and your Basic Directory Information.

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Quick How-To On Contents Privacy Settings

February 18, 2010

In December 2009, Facebook rolled out new privacy settings that gave more power to the users to exercise privacy settings on every piece of content like status updates, links, photos, videos that they share on Facebook apart from the account settings that they have chosen.

Facebook is extending the same privacy controls on contents share through any third-party applications.

To use the privacy control:

1. Simply click on the ‘lock’ icon on the Publisher on your home page or profile, or the prompts that appear when you share from applications or Facebook Connect websites.

Content privacy 300x119 Quick How To On Contents Privacy Settings

2. Select the group of people you want to share with from the list or select the ‘customize’ option to include or exclude selected people on your network.

3. ‘Share’  or ‘Publish’.

Content privacy2 300x148 Quick How To On Contents Privacy Settings

One can use third-party applications settings for:

Sharing contents that can be view by only a few selected people, who shares a common interest in the particular post by specifying them through the ‘custom’ option.

Or share with the broadest audience possible such as information on an important organization you’re supporting. For Example, The Causes application on Facebook.

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Facebook Extends Privacy Settings On Third-Party Applications

February 18, 2010

Facebook tightened the privacy settings with the launch of new privacy settings in December 2009. The new controls allowed users to customize privacy for each piece of content shared on Facebook including status updates, links, photos and videos.

Now, Facebook is tightening privacy on contents shared through third-party applications.

“Today we are responding to your continued feedback by extending that same level of control to content shared through applications,” said Facebook software engineer Ray He in a blog post.

“These new controls give you the power to determine who see the content you post to Facebook through any third-party application, whether on Facebook.com, your desktop, mobile phone or from a Facebook Connect web site or service,” he adds.

A Facebook spokeswoman explained that all Facebook applications and integrations will have access to the new controls, which will “automatically appear on Feed forms and Publisher integrations even if the developer does nothing”.

Users may also start to see additional prompts in applications asking if they’d like to set privacy for certain pieces of content that differ from your default setting.

The tool lets Facebook members determine accessibility to posted content, such as status updates or pictures in categories designated “Friends,” “Friends of Friends,” “Everyone” and “Customized.”

“Whether you choose to keep your default setting on everything you share or change the audience for different pieces of content, the choice is yours,” he adds.

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Facebook To Get Rid Of Regional Networks

December 2, 2009

fb settings b3 Facebook To Get Rid Of Regional NetworksIn an open letter to users that appeared on the site Wednesday morning, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg said the social networking site has outgrown the usefulness of regional networks.

With roughly 350 millions users, Facebook is enhancing its privacy controls and eliminating its regional framework for online communities.

When Facebook launched in early 2004 as an online network for college students to stay connected, the model centered on sharing information with “networks” of school friends. Over time, the network expanded to companies and regions as well.

Almost 50 percent of all Facebook users are members of regional networks, with some regions encompassing entire countries, such as India and China.

“As Facebook has grown, some of these regional networks now have millions of members and we’ve concluded that this is no longer the best way for you to control your privacy,” Zuckerberg said.

“We are adding something that many of you have asked for – the ability to control who sees each individual piece of content you create of upload. In addition, we will also be fulfilling a request made by many of you to make the privacy-settings page simpler by combining some settings,” he said.

“The plan we’ve come up with is to remove regional networks completely and create a simpler model for privacy control where you can set content to be available to only your friends, friends of our friends, or everyone.”

In the letter, Facebook’s users will be asked to review and update their privacy settings. A message on the site will explain the changes and take users to the page where they can update the settings, Zuckerberg said.

So far, more than 22,000 users have posted comments on Zuckerberg’s letter, most of which are positive feed backs.

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