Make Your Facebook Account Private

http://howto.wired.com/wiki/Make_Your_Facebook_Account_Private?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29

Facebook recently (in December, 2009) unveiled a radically revamped set of privacy controls. They are better and more forward-thinking than its previous efforts, but Facebook made one very important change in late 2009: almost all user data is now made public by default.

Facebook users were asked to verify their privacy settings using Facebook's "Privacy transition tool" that recommended some default settings. Oddly, the suggested defaults made most profile settings, photo uploads, status updates and application settings viewable by everyone on the internet. This means the whole world could see everything Facebook users post if they didn't change the defaults.

---

This update takes advantage of the average unaware Facebook user. Facebook should have followed a status quo update model and not change a user's privacy for them. The concept of a "Privacy transition tool" is only as useful as its accessibility and Facebook did not think about the Internet of Things. Many Facebook users only check their profiles via an iPhone or other device and it seems that Facebook did not do a good job at universally announcing this privacy update.