New Facebook Privacy Changes

Click on the below presentation to have a good look at the new Facebook privacy changes.  Generally positive, in that Facebook will put all the privacy settings in one place and eliminate regional networks.  So many users thought their profiles were open only to friends, but were in a regional network where default settings left items like photos open to all 10 million people in the region.  I also like that users will be able to decide who should see items at the time they publish or share them.

Note, however,  that the new defaults make more information in new profiles public by default, and ask current users to update their settings to make some basic information public – such as your hometown, religion, marital status etc.  Facebook explains that this is to help users better find each other.  I get that, because the other day I was looking through 25 profiles of someone with a common name and couldnt figure out which was my old pal. (Pics were of dogs, kids, mountains or no pic!….hometown and religion would have been a good clue!).  I am pleased that they do not make birth date public in the new flow, that would surely annoy some of my friends and family who are touchy about their age.  One piece of advice for users – hide your hometown, too many companies use it as your security question.

Facebook’s Complete Privacy Presentation.

Here is what I said to the AP.

“They are learning how to listen carefully to their users,” said Jules Polonetsky, co-chairman and director of the Washington-based Future of Privacy Forum and former chief privacy officer at AOL. He added that Facebook has learned from the past that suddenly making big changes, whatever they are, has not been the most effective approach.

“To be lots of things to lots of different kinds of people,” Polonetsky said, Facebook needs to give its users, who come from different cultures, age groups and career levels, more control over what they share on the site.