Facebook are constantly changing their policies hence user account settings are constantly being updated also. I noticed last year that there are a lot more options to customize your account and news feed. Having some free time on hand, and thinking about the friends I helped with their FB settings, I decided to write up a post on how to secure facebook account and make it somewhat "private" ! It's interesting to know how many people thought their page is private when in fact it's open for all the world to see :-) Hopefully this post will be helpful to you !
First thing first, after you log into your FB account, let's set your account to private - as in only people who are your "friends" can see your page.
*NOTE: all the settings are best done from a desktop or laptop. Mobile devices are limited on the options it provide.
Last thing to do now is to clear all info. on Apps Others Use. Click to open Apps, and on the pop up window, unchecked all the boxes here. What are these ? when your friends download an app, that app would ask to pull info from all of their friends (you included) and your friend most likely would click "YES". All info from your page will be pulled by the Apps' developer and they most likely use it for advertisement, stats, track usage, or other things. Avoid to release as much info. as you can !
MANUALLY APPROVE POST AND PICTURE YOU'RE TAGGED IN
If you want to have control of what is shared on your page's timeline by other friends, this is a good setting to enabled on your account.
To do this, on the top blue menu bar of your page, on the far right hand side, click on the down arrow icon (also known as Account Settings). On the drop down menu list, locate and click on Activity Log.
A new screen will open up, on the left menu panel, locate and click on Timeline Review to see all the notifications on your page. On the same line as the Timeline Review title, there're 2 icons on the right side. One is a wheel icon and one is a magnification glass, click on the wheel icon.
This icon will open a pop up window. On this window, click on the down arrow and select Enable this control. When you're tagged in a post or a picture, you will be notified and you can decide if you want to approve - Add to Timeline - or Hide (not show up on your timeline).
Click on it and select Edit Privacy. A window will open up and on here, click on the down arrow to select who you want to see your list. To make it private, select Only Me.
That's about all for SECURITY AND PRIVACY settings I can conjure up at the moment ! hopefully this is easy for you to follow.
Another thing to keep in mind when on FB is, any where you see an arrow sign, when you click on it a menu will open up. In the image below, the first down arrow allows me to make my picture Public or Friends or Only Me. The picture of people next to the arrow means only my Friends can see it. If it's a globe picture next to the arrow then it means my picture is avail for all to see (Public).
The second arrow on the right side opens up a menu to allow me to edit my post (text) or delete it all together.
Recently my news feed is filled with way too many re-shares and posts of strangers and groups and companies that my friends "like". I hate this new settings on FB. That everything my friends "like" shows up on my news feed. I don't really need to know every single one of their "like" do I ? Anyways, fed up with more ads and self help articles and less about the people I want updates on, I decided to customize my news feed.
First thing first, after you log into your FB account, let's set your account to private - as in only people who are your "friends" can see your page.
*NOTE: all the settings are best done from a desktop or laptop. Mobile devices are limited on the options it provide.
SECURITY & PRIVACY SETTINGS
Let's set up the privacy of your page ! After you log into your page, take note of the top blue menu bar of your page. This is where all your account access and settings are located. Click on the down arrow icon at the far right corner (also known as Account Settings in the picture below)
A drop down menu will open up, click on Settings (near the bottom of the list), then a new screen will open up like the one below. On the left menu panel, select Security.
I circled the 2 settings I set up but feel free to set all the others (do take sometime to read the explanation next to the option. If you don't know what it is, best to ignore). The reason I selected those is because I know a few friends who got their accounts hacked. The Login Approvals and Trusted Contacts will help me gain access to my account should the hacker changed my password or log in from an unknown browser.
Once the above is done, move onto Privacy settings.
In here you can set up how you want your page to look like to your Friends and others. Click on Edit on the right side to set the settings.
Most account options on Facebook has 4 settings: Public (everyone can see your timeline - what's on your page), Friends (only people you're friends with can see your timeline), Only Me (only you can see) and Custom (different viewing options). I suggest you set all settings to Friends to keep your page viewable only those you're friends with. I have mine set up as Custom because I have a friends and family groups and I like to keep them separate at times. You can also use this Custom setting to block 1 or 20 friends from seeing a certain post or picture.
Next up on the menu panel is Timeline and Tagging Settings. This section is where you set up others' rights on your timeline. Click on Edit on the right side to select the setting you want. I set mine to all Friends as I only want my friends to be able to post a message or a picture on my timeline.
For the Review posts _ and Review tags _ setting options, make sure to set it to ON. This is to ensure that you get to review posts and pictures of you first and then you can decide if you want to approve or hide it from your timeline.
Want to block a friend from viewing your facebook page ? the Blocking setting is for that. Click on Blocking in the Settings menu, then add the name of the people you want to block to the Blocked list. Some of you who read this probably wonder, who uses this ? You'll be surprised ! many people are friends with people they don't really want to be friends with :-) but too nice to deny their friends request. This is the solution to limit access to your timeline.
Last thing to do now is to clear all info. on Apps Others Use. Click to open Apps, and on the pop up window, unchecked all the boxes here. What are these ? when your friends download an app, that app would ask to pull info from all of their friends (you included) and your friend most likely would click "YES". All info from your page will be pulled by the Apps' developer and they most likely use it for advertisement, stats, track usage, or other things. Avoid to release as much info. as you can !
MANUALLY APPROVE POST AND PICTURE YOU'RE TAGGED IN
If you want to have control of what is shared on your page's timeline by other friends, this is a good setting to enabled on your account.
To do this, on the top blue menu bar of your page, on the far right hand side, click on the down arrow icon (also known as Account Settings). On the drop down menu list, locate and click on Activity Log.
A new screen will open up, on the left menu panel, locate and click on Timeline Review to see all the notifications on your page. On the same line as the Timeline Review title, there're 2 icons on the right side. One is a wheel icon and one is a magnification glass, click on the wheel icon.
This icon will open a pop up window. On this window, click on the down arrow and select Enable this control. When you're tagged in a post or a picture, you will be notified and you can decide if you want to approve - Add to Timeline - or Hide (not show up on your timeline).
HIDE YOUR FRIENDS LIST
If you're like me, I like my Friends list be private so friends and strangers don't know who I'm friends with. To do that, after you log in, click on your name at the top bar to open your page:
Once you're at your page, click on Friends to view your Friends list. At the top right corner of this list, look for a pen icon that looks like this:
Click on it and select Edit Privacy. A window will open up and on here, click on the down arrow to select who you want to see your list. To make it private, select Only Me.
That's about all for SECURITY AND PRIVACY settings I can conjure up at the moment ! hopefully this is easy for you to follow.
Another thing to keep in mind when on FB is, any where you see an arrow sign, when you click on it a menu will open up. In the image below, the first down arrow allows me to make my picture Public or Friends or Only Me. The picture of people next to the arrow means only my Friends can see it. If it's a globe picture next to the arrow then it means my picture is avail for all to see (Public).
The second arrow on the right side opens up a menu to allow me to edit my post (text) or delete it all together.
Below is a little "bonus" :-) I was so annoyed with my news feed (the Home page where you see all updates and shares from your friends) so I went and changed some settings and it is so much better now ! Enjoy !
NEWS FEED PREFERENCES SETTINGS
Recently my news feed is filled with way too many re-shares and posts of strangers and groups and companies that my friends "like". I hate this new settings on FB. That everything my friends "like" shows up on my news feed. I don't really need to know every single one of their "like" do I ? Anyways, fed up with more ads and self help articles and less about the people I want updates on, I decided to customize my news feed.
To do this, go into Account Settings, then click on News Feed Preferences. On the pop up window, you can select who you want to see most (they get first prioritize on your news feed) and who you want to see less/nothing from (unfollow them). This is done in the background so the people wouldn't know if you prioritize them or unfollow them. I have a few over-sharers that I feel hi jacked my whole news feed so I have to unfollow them.
If you don't want to completely Unfollow someone, another way to do it is to manually hide certain post from them.
On your news feed, at the corner of the person's post there's a grey down arrow. Click on it to open up an option menu. On here you can select Hide Post, Hide All from "friend's name", or Unfollow them.
*I used a group as example to get the screen capture below but it can be done for individual too.
*I used a group as example to get the screen capture below but it can be done for individual too.
