Facebook – 5 important Settings which are often ignored
In last few years, Facebook has emerged as the most viewed and most loved social sharing network over the internet. If you know how to surf internet, most probably you will have a Facebook account. Currently, Facebook is the second most viewed website in the world after Google. You can see Facebook everywhere – websites using like buttons, mobile and tab applications and even printed on t-shirts and caps. The main reasons for it being so successful is the simplicity of sharing information. You just update your status or share a picture and it gets available to all your friends and rest of the world based on your preference. It is really easy to find your old friends or classmates here – if they use internet, most probably they will be here. It has made our life so simple! Sharing what is currently going on, your thoughts, pictures, videos, etc. is becoming a new trend among young generations.
But with every good and popular thing, there are people with bad intentions also. You must have heard or read several stories of people being victims of Facebook frauds. Since you are letting others know where you are, what you are planning today, when you go out of your home, who are your family and friends, your photographs; you are vulnerable to the frauds and can easily put yourself in to big trouble. It is really easy to know the sensitive and personal information about you if you are not cautious.
Today, I am going to list down the Facebook settings which are extremely important and will help you keep your information safe and secure.
Secure Browsing
In case your data is sensitive, it is advisable to enable the secure browsing in Facebook. By default, when you typewww.facebook.com in your browser, it resolves to https://www.facebook.com/. However, when you turn secure browsing on, the URL will start with https (s meaning secure). Most of the sensitive websites like internet banking use secure browsing. This ensures that the data which is being transferred between your computer and server is encrypted and secure.
To enable secure browsing, log in to your Facebook account and go to settings. In security, edit secure browsing and check “Browse Facebook on a secure connection (https) when possible” and save changes.
Login Notifications
You might have heard the complaints of Facebook accounts being hacked. Although Facebook has taken steps to prevent this to happen, chances of your account being hacked cannot be completely ruled out. And once your account is hacked, the hacker can do whatever he wants to. The hacker can read all your private messages, post on your behalf, delete important information or conversations, share photographs and what not?
For preventing this to happen and getting notified when someone attempts to hack your account, it is advisable to enable login notification. You have the option to receive email or text message in case someone logs in to your account from a computer or mobile device which you have never used. That way you will get to know if some intruder has logged in and take appropriate action in time.
For enabling login notification, go to account settings -> security and edit login notification. It is recommended to select “Text message/Push notification” for getting the notification on your mobile phone. You will be asked to enter your password and phone number.
Once you put your phone number and click OK, you will be sent a text message with a six digit number and will be asked to enter this number for phone number confirmation. Once you confirm it, your text message notification is enabled.
Privacy Settings
By default when you update your status or share photographs, it is visible to everyone. Though you have the option to select who can see this post by selecting it from the audience selector drop-down menu; most of the times you forget to change it from “public” which is selected by default. This can be a big problem for your privacy as anybody can see your private information. To overcome this problem; you can change the privacy settings to select audience as “friends” by default.
Go to privacy settings -> Who can see my stuffs -> Who can see your future posts and edit the settings. Choose “friends” from audience selector menu. Now if you wish to share your post to public domain; you can always select “public” for your individual posts. But by default, it will be visible to only your friends.
Don’t worry if you have shared something to public in the past, but now want to limit your audience. You have the option to review all your posts. Click on activity log and all your past posts and tags will be available month wise. You have the option to select any entry from your timeline, posts, likes, comments and tags and change its privacy settings.
App Settings
As the Facebook is growing; there are many websites and applications which lets you use your Facebook account to login. While granting them access, you are notified by Facebook what all this website or application can do on your behalf. Most of the time you are in hurry and just keep clicking on OK. But the website or malicious application can have access to your friend’s list, your posts, photographs and even create new posts on your behalf.
You may have seen many updates in Facebook which are not posted by real user. These look more like advertisement and if you click them, you will also be asked to register to that app or website. Sometimes back, I came across an application which claimed to let you know who visited your Facebook profile. It keeps on posting fake updates on your timeline about your profile visits. Once somebody clicks on it, that person will also be tempted to register.
If you are trapped by such malicious application or website, your data may be compromised. In the settings tab go to Apps. You will get the list of all the applications that you use and which you have granted permissions. Review which are not reliable or you don’t trust by clicking on it. You will see what permissions you have granted and what this application can do on your behalf. Here, you can change the settings as per your needs. Remove the applications which you don’t use or which you don’t intend to use in future.
Blocking
Are you being nagged by someone who sends you continuous friend’s request? Or you don’t want to continue being friends with someone? You have the option to block users and the person will be removed from your friend’s list and will not be able to interact with you. Sometimes you may want to block the person without removing him or her from friend’s list. You have the option to add your friend to the restricted list and the person will be able to see only your public posts. And the best thing is he or she will never know that you have added him or her to your restricted list.
Apart from users, you can also block the apps, apps invites and even invites. You just have to go to “blocking” section of privacy settings and add to the block lists as per your requirements.
Final Words
It is important to be safe and secure your sensitive information on Facebook. The above settings can make your life simpler by adding extra level of protection to your account and securing your private information.
Although really important, these settings are often ignored by most of the users. My recommendation is to please take a little time and make appropriate changes in these settings to make your Facebook experience more secure and tension-free!