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September 2011: The Definitive Facebook Lockdown Guide

By | September 4, 2011, 12:42pm PDT

Summary: Facebook’s privacy and security settings have changed massively. It’s time to catch up and ensure your settings are up to date.

Every single Facebook user should now have the brand new privacy settings, which have changed radically since the last update.

With brand new features and revamped settings to play with — this three-day holiday weekend is a perfect opportunity for you to take a look at your Facebook account, profile and privacy settings, and lock them down.

However, because of Facebook’s expected profile, account and privacy shift earlier this month, an awful lot has changed — as you will no doubt have noticed.

The previous Lockdown Guides have been some of the most popular content on ZDNet to date.

Each gallery guide will walk you through a crucial focus area of Facebook’s settings, and will run through every single setting, option and feature available to users, to ensure that your privacy is as protected as it can be.

Gallery guide 1: Secure your friends lists

New guide: This guide is a crucial focus to the remaining guides, showing you how to create lists of friends, such as colleagues and family, as well as a ‘limited profile’, allowing you to limit updates and uploaded content from those you do not want to share with.

Gallery guide 2: Secure your profile page

Updated: Believe it or not, your profile settings page is now where your privacy settings are. This guide will walk you through the updated user-interface, as well as the recommended settings for each section of your profile.

Gallery guide 3: Secure your account settings

Updated: Your account settings are at the heart of your Facebook, and have changed significantly. This guide reflects those major changes, and shows you how to be secure using the world’s largest social network. It also helps you manage your data, including a full section on how to manage the applications and games that are connected to your account.

Gallery guide 4: Secure your privacy settings

Updated: Everything has changed! Included in this guide are the new privacy features that Facebook rolled out earlier this month, including changes to how you are tagged, and who can share your data. You can also manage your block lists from here, and make sweeping permissions changes to your old posts.

Gallery guide 5: Secure the miscellaneous bits

Updated: This guide will show you how to download all of your data, as well as showing you how to manage your BlackBerry and iPhone settings. Also, seeing as your status update window has changed, it will show you how to set locations and tag friends in a safe way, and how to create private events that are limited to your network.

If you want more clarification on a particular feature, check out the related content links below, which cover the new Facebook settings in detail. Or, if something looks out of place (incorrect or broken), then leave a comment below.

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Related content:

Also see:

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Topics

Zack Whittaker, a criminologist who studied at the University of Kent, Canterbury, is a journalist, writer and broadcaster.

Disclosure

Zack Whittaker

I worked briefly with Microsoft UK in 2006 but no longer have any connection with the company. Regardless, I remain impartial and unbiased in my views.

I don't hold any stock or shares, investments or industrial secrets in any company, but have signed confidentiality agreements with a number of UK and U.S. organisations, whose names I am not at liberty to disclose.

I was involved with Kent Union, the University of Kent's student union, undertaking voluntary, non-salaried, elected positions between early 2009 and mid-2010.

No other company, body, government department, non-governmental organisation or third sector organisation employs me or pays me a salary in any capacity whatsoever.

As a freelance journalist, whenever expenses are given and taken by a company that is not CBS Interactive, these will be disclosed in each relevant post to ensure transparency.

I currently work with a UK law enforcement unit, but this is an entirely separate position which bears no connection to other work.

(Updated: 23rd October 2011)

Biography

Zack Whittaker

Zack Whittaker, criminologist who studied at the University of Kent, UK, is a journalist, writer and broadcaster.

After studying criminology at university, though still in his early-20's, he has already had a series unconventional work and voluntary positions. He has worked with researchers studying neurological illnesses like Tourette's syndrome (which he suffers from), has given lectures on the nature of disabilities in the public community, and occasionally ends up speaking on television and radio discussing the events of the day.

He first had academic work published at the age of 22, then still an undergraduate, and has been cited by a wide range of publications: from the Huffington Post, Business Insider, AllThingsDigital, The Atlantic Wire and CBS News.

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wheelrefurbishment 12th May
Very useful post for facebook users. I believe scientificially made it to find hard especially remove an account or remove friend.
Tag review is the best thing to come out of this
@mike2k Agreed.
wm
@mike2k

Yes, money in the back pocket of feds to sell our fair use right farther down the river in the name of corporate revenue.
0 Votes
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Facebook: A Day Late and a Dollar Short
Dietrich T. Schmitz * Your Linux Advocate 4th Sep
Friends come on ova to Google Plus.
It's not just for geeks.
0 Votes
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facebook friends
gdsgss 4th Sep
is it possible to keep my friend list private so only I can see it?
0 Votes
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Contributr
@gdsgss Yes, all your friends lists are private.
@gdsgss for the future needs you can visit Facebook help center. Options exits but hard to find. I believe scientificially made it to find hard especially remove an account or remove friend. Social sites like Facebook is nightmare for beginners because of these traps.
So many extra clicks, so much extra stuff to make it work - I do very much prefer Google+'s circles. They're simpler.
Hi Zack, very well explained. Everyone will for sure need to do like you say if they using facebook. New features in facebook like Chat will be great but we still waiting...
Thanks Zack- this looks really comprehensive. Some of these new "privacy settings" are precisely the opposite of "private". I wondered if you could give advice about 2 things:

1. The new "audience selector" privacy setting is actually VISIBLE to the audience!! This is a major issue, especially with "custom" sharing, which allows the audience to see who the owner has excluded! BIG PROBLEM! Can that be disabled (ie. the ability of the viewer to see the privacy setting?)

2. You have a section on limiting past posts (effectively the entire wall)- but it's permanent, and limited to friends (not "only me"). Is there no way to reversibly hide/ unhide the wall (to specific people, and as narrowly as "only me") as before?

Thanks, Belinda
@belindakm I believe scientificially made it to find hard especially remove an account or remove friend. With rak offshore I think will be much better. Social sites like Facebook is nightmare for beginners and love meter for oldies because of these traps.
Great Work! Thanks!
hI. The new settings are unnecessarily complicated! I just realized that friends who couldn't view my wall before now see my posts and recent activity (unless I select each friend I want to hide a post from). Please how do I hide my wall from quite a number of people??
0 Votes
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Contributr
@kaydeejay You can find all the settings necessary in the 'privacy' guide -- there's a link in the article.
@kaydeejay First time, it can be harder. You'll get used to it by time. Please check facebook help center here: https://www.facebook.com/help/?tab=search

Also guide is very clear and useful. As a facebook addict i loved it.
@kaydeejay
Hi,

You can unsubscribe from the people you are fb friends with, or modify what you get from them. It will greatly reduce the volume of posts.
A new service named SafebookID enables users to sign in from their smartphone device - iPhone and/or Adnroid device to their personal account in FB

It works with OpenID protocol

I'm using it and it works perfectly well

http://www.facebook.com/SafeBookID?sk=app_264356536916485

JL
Thank you for posting this helpful review! I have added this guide to my Google RSS feed & saved it to my things to do list! It's much appreciated. It seems like as soon as I have things configured the way I think I want it on Facebook, Facebook changes. It's quite annoying to say the least!

BTW, I'm enjoying the simplicity and creativeness of Google + though more and more wink
Do you have any guide on how to permanently delete a facebook account? i want to delete mien and i can't find information about deleting an account. wheat intolerance
@pjlatombo Hi, you can find guide in the facebook help, there where you canfind and rak offshore guide if you now what i mean.
Very useful post for facebook users.
0 Votes
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I have a better solution.
Tony R. 10th Oct
Use only 100% fake profiles on Facebook. If someone tries to misuse the data, they'll go nowhere.
1. The new "audience selector" privacy setting is actually VISIBLE to the audience!! This is a major issue, especially with dress up games sharing, which allows the audience to see who the owner has excluded! BIG PROBLEM! Can that be disabled (ie. the ability of the viewer to see the privacy setting?)

2. You have a section on limiting past posts (effectively the entire wall)- but it's permanent, and limited to friends (not "only me"). Is there no way to reversibly hide/ unhide the wall (to specific people, and as narrowly as "only me") as before?
Cool stuff.
Best thing of all: NO FACEBOOK ACCOUNT! Had one and deleted it. Came back on another Facebook site... And after my lawyer sent a few trial threats to them they deleted that too. Hate all the red tape! After all we have phones, mobiles, instant messenger, email... Why letting everybody know who you are and what you do?!? Does privacy mean anything anymore?!?
The privacy of fb is brilliant as compare to other social sites.
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The best option...
Hatestone Johnson 10th Jan
...is to not have a FB account in the first place. No personal information worries, no reading about your FB friends and their relationship drama, no viewing pics of what your FB friends are having for dinner, no need to worry about venture capital firm In-Q-Tel and their CIA ties funding FB's startup, no worries about the DHS scouring social networking sites, etc., etc., etc.

Would you stand on a street corner and freely give away all your personal information to complete strangers? Me either, but yet you do so online without a second thought?

If everyone is on FB, what's so special about it?
i say to shut down each web page that let any one get you info like facebook qoogle or any other web page and if they give it to any one shut that company down for good yes i mean facebook or google or more and they do not need to spy on usa people that love this usa and so burp
You have got to be kidding...am I suppose to print and put all this information into a booklet created by me? Please put in PDF format. So far "5" Gallery Guides to read.
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Unfortunately, while Facebook is improving, they still need better defaults. Most privacy issues on Facebook are self-inflicted - girl comes home from a party and posts some pictures she'll regret. People can't even comprehend basic stuff like not posting your drunk photos publicly on Facebook so that employers don't see them. When there's iPhone apps broadcasting your location, services like http://www.dirtyphonebook.com that broadcast even more of this personally identifying information out there, and with Google consolidating this information and making it accessible to everybody I think there are some very serious privacy issues that many people do not quite yet understand. Everybody is ripping Facebook for privacy violations, but quite honestly, most privacy issues on Facebook are self-inflicted mistakes by people. There's a lot more that can be done about educating people about privacy, and being careful about how you use your phone is a good first step, but its a bit depressing because it goes way beyond this to just about any aspect of the internet that you use.
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Awsome Post
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Excellent
espl06 Updated - 13th Apr
I think there are some very serious privacy issues that many people do not quite yet understand. Everybody is ripping Facebook for privacy violations, but quite honestly, most privacy issues on Facebook are self-inflicted mistakes by people.
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Good write, but i have mail to my gmail acc, somebody registred Facebook acc to my gmail mail. This is bot programm?

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wheelrefurbishment 12th May
Very useful post for facebook users. I believe scientificially made it to find hard especially remove an account or remove friend.

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