How to configure privacy options on Facebook? step by step guide

Many times we find content on the Internet about the different dangers to which we submit when using social networksand many choose not to be present in them to avoid them.

Experts believe that, in order to avoid the dangers that threaten us, we must reduce the content we publish. But today, we will tell you that they exist other measures to improve the privacy of our profiles.

The privacy policies allow us to configure our accountsso that they filter all published information. In this article we will explain the steps you must follow to improve the privacy of our profiles.

Why is it important to configure Facebook privacy options?

Since social media startedThese have markedly increased the level of insecurity in our lives. But, on many occasions, such a thing is the result of our own carelessness, not only because of the amount of information that we provide, but also because of the bad privacy settings we have. With the correct configuration we can prevent third parties from snooping in our accounts or obtain information from it without our permission.

The best example that we can obtain so that you understand what we are talking about is the privacy violation that occurred in Facebook with Cambridge Analytica, where it used the information of profiles not configured without the consent of the users, situation that harmed Facebook because mark zuckerberg never spoke out against this act. The process consisted of steal profile information when people accessed pages in Facebook or any other site.

Where Cambridge Analytics used that information for their personal purposes. The idea of ​​this story is that Cambridge Analytica was able to obtain information thanks to users not setting up their accounts. social networks including Facebook, count on privacy policieswhere are included in it freedom in configuration of it, limiting the content that our external parties see, without reducing what we publish.

What are the main risks to my privacy on Facebook?

The privacy risks are always presenteven in our comments on the blogs, however its seriousness is not recognized for not having as much fame and audience What Facebook, where any weakness becomes a scandal. The greatest danger of our privacyis mostly given by the settings of our profile and the amount of information we supply. However, when control what they can or cannot see from our profilewe must not reduce the information we leave.

The most relevant risks that we can find in this famous social network are the following:

• privacy violation
• Harassment situations
• Blackmail, bribes or threats
• Identity theft
• Others more…

Facebook can provide information, from our relatives, friends, and even the place where we work or study, details that thinking with a criminal mind, are perfect data to destroy a person’s life.

Learn step by step how to configure Facebook privacy from scratch

Security and privacy comes first, and for that reason we leave you the step by step for you to learn to configure Facebook privacy from scratch.

We recommend that you read carefully and review each of our steps, so as to avoid confusion:

• Before everything we must log in at our Facebook account. Then, we click on “Plus” distinguished by the arrow pointing down. A list of options will be displayed and we will only select where it says “Setting”.

• It will load us a window where we will find a list of options.

Each one allows us to perform or activate some functions, such as:

profile privacy

The option of privacy has two sectionsone that allows us configure our activity and another that gives us the power to change the way they can find us and how they should contact us. In the first section, it has several options that we can configure to our liking. The main one is to determine who can see our posts.

Normally it is configured so that our publications are available for public access, but clicking on “Edit” we will have the possibility to change this option. After clicking on “Edit“we look where it says”Public”, will display a list of options where we can decide if we want only our friends, with exceptions, or a more personalized option, those who have access to our publications.

if we wish get a record of all the tags that have been made to our profilewe must click on “Use activity log” and it will load us with a list of all the posts where our contacts have mentioned us. Also, we can limit who can have access to our previous publications, limiting which of our friends or contacts can search among the posts that have been loaded later. Although, if we have tagged people, these they will continue to have access to them.

For configure this optionwe must click on “Limit the audience of previous posts”then it will display a description of the option, and we click on the action again.

Instantly it will ask us again if we want the action to be carried out and we must click again on “Limit the audience of past posts” and the configuration change is done.

Second section: How you can find us

In the second section, we can configure the following options:

• Who can send us friend requests: the original configuration allows anyone to do it, but clicking on “Edit” we can choose between “All” or the “Friends of friends”.
• People who can see the friends list: In general, everyone who accesses our profile can see our list of friends. Although this can be configured, by clicking on “Edit” and choosing that only our friends or with a more personalized filter can have access.
• Who can find us with the mail: If someone enters the registration email in Facebook can find our profile, but we can limit the results, preventing the general public from being able to find us in this way way.
• You can find us by entering the phone number: Like entering the mail, just by entering the phone number they can get our profile, but this can change limiting to only the friends of our friends, for these results.
• Finally we can choose if we want search engines to link in their results to our profileor we do not want it to appear in the Google SERPs. The option is simply to choose yes or no, to change the settings.

face recognition

To go to the facial recognition option or sectionwe must click on the option with the Name, which is in the list of options on the left side menu.

The facial recognition option is used so that Facebook run a recognition algorithm, to tell us when our friends have posted photos or videos where we appear. To change whether or not we want to activate this function, we must click on “Edit”, then it will allow us to change the configuration accepting or denying facial recognition.

Biography and labeling

In this section we can apply configuration to our Biography, limiting who can or cannot see or publish in it, as well as in the label and in the review. In total, there would be nine options available for privacy settings.

The first option we have question “Who can post on your timeline?” and clicking on it or on “Edit” we can decide if we want to deprive only us of having that option or all our friends.

Continuing with the configuration of our biography we can click on “Edit” in the option “Who can see what others post on your timeline?” and change from the original option (“Friends“) a “Just me” or to a more personalized decision. Normally when we post on Facebook, all our friends and not, can share it, however we can click “Allow other people to share your posts on their stories?” Y “Deactivate” option, preventing us from sharing our content.

If we want a stricter profile, we simply have to insert the words that we do not want to be public in our profile, they can be addresses, telephone number or other. To do this we select where it says “Hide comments containing specific words” and then upload a file .CSV containing a list of them, or add them manually one by one.

As for the label section, we can change the option from “Who can see tagged content?” Y “Who do we want to add to have access to the tags?” clicking on “Edit” we will change the option in a custom way. For the last options we only have to “Activate or desactivate” if we want to take control of what we are tagged and published before it is public. If we click on “To see how” we will enter the profile as an external.

public publications

In Public Posts, we can manage who can follow us, the comments, notifications, profile information, comment rating, username and see if our account is linked with Twitter.

To decide who can or cannot follow us, we only have to select the drop-down list and change from “Friends” to “Public” in general, although for greater privacy it is recommended that we only allow our friends to follow us. The comments of publications and notifications of the same, are two different options that we can adjust similarly. Just by clicking on “Edit“We can decide if we want them to be ours”Friends”.

Also they “Friends of friends” or maybe the “Public” who can comment and interact with our content. There are contents in our profile, such as cover photos, videos, featured photos and others that should not be commented on by strangers, since we must prevent denigrating or insulting comments, so selecting the option “Public Profile Information” and changing from “Public” a “Friends” we may limit this permission.

In the option of “Feedback Rating“, we will can “Activate or desactivate” Featured comments, whose function is to first show the most relevant opinions published in our content. Mainly it is recommended to disable this function. As for the option of “Username” and “Twitter” do not help much to the privacy of our profile. However, it is exhorted to never place our full username, but rather our first name and last name.

locks

In locks, we can manage people with restricted access, user blocks, messages, application invitations and pages. The first option allows us manage the restriction to some of our contacts. By simply selecting the user, you will not have access to our content that is not intended for the “Public”.

if we see each other threatened or any other similar situationmust block the user, preventing you from having permission to view our content or communicate with us. To do this we write in the field “block users” the name of the profile that we are going to deprive.

As in the previous process, we must write the name of the person in the fields next to “Block messages from” Y “Block invitations from” to deny the actions and prevent them from bothering us. The last option, “block pages”, we must write the name of the page that we want to deprive, so that they cannot publish in our biography or send us messages. Thus we prevent attackers from bribing us or obtain information from us.

Location Options

Just by clicking on “View location history” we will be able to see the registry that Facebook saves of the times that we have logged in in different places. When we try to access because it is a very sensitive data, Facebook it will ask for our password.

Although, if we do not have activated the “Location History” we will not be able to see the record. We must click on “Edit” and then change from “Off to On option” what for Facebook start keeping track of all our locations. The benefit of this option is to monitor our locations so that we can check that no one has access to our account. It is a method used by people with large accounts to act quickly in the face of a hack.

Messenger status

Been in FacebookMessenger either “stories”, as we can find, it allows us to configure the sharing options, allowing or not allowing other people to share content in our stories, or giving permissions for the people we mention in our statuses may or may not share our stories.

We just have to click on “Edit” and change from the drop-down options the option to “Allow” a “Do not allow” or vice versa. It is a somewhat strict way of preventing people from posting offensive or false content on our profiles.