Time to check your Facebook privacy settings again

No one doubts the benefits of Facebook for keeping in touch with friends. But you really need to keep an eye on the privacy options. Not only are they rather complicated but they seem to change on an almost fortnightly basis. The latest is 'Instant personalisation', where Facebook will share some of your information with other websites as soon as you arrive on them.

According to the settings page the information shared is only that which has already been set to be publically available and 'All our partners are required to respect your information'.

The settings page is not that easy to find, requiring four clicks (five if you count closing the introductory video) through different menus. To find it click on Account, Privacy Settings, Edit your settings in the Apps and websites section at the bottom and then Edit Settings in the Instant personalisation section. Phew.

It's not so much that the information is can be shared that worries me, it's that the option is turned on by default. I don't know if there's a message from from Facebook when it is enabled on an account. The option is greyed out on my account (though still with a tick in the option box) as it is not available to me yet.

My thanks to an old school friend who posted about this.