How to keep your Facebook profile safe

Facebook, with its 2.6 billion monthly active users, is one of the largest social networking websites. But this success hasn’t come without its privacy concerns. There are a number of simple things that you can do to keep your profile safe from prying eyes. And if you're still not convinced, the company has also given users an option to bulk delete your older Facebook posts as well. From something as simple as locking your Facebook Profile to restricting your data for ads and even keeping apps in check, here are some of the best ways to keep your Facebook profile safe:

Lock your profile

• This feature allows users in India to lock their profile from “non-friends”.
• Log onto Facebook.
• Open your profile by clicking on your display picture icon.
• Click on the three dots below your profile picture.
• Click on ‘Lock Your Profile’.

Off-Facebook Activity

This new feature allows users to look at a summary of information Facebook collected about you from your phone, even when the app is not running. You can clear the summary by following these steps:

• Log onto Facebook
• Go to the right menu on the app and scroll down to click on ‘Setting and Privacy’.
• Click on ‘Settings’
• Scroll down to the ‘Your Facebook information’ and click on ‘Off-Facebook Activity’.
• Click on ‘Manage your Off-Facebook activity’ and enter your password
• Tap on ‘Clear History’ to erase information that has been collected about you.

Restrict your data for Ads

• Facebook uses data about you to sell to advertisers and you can restrict advertisers to access any data about you by following these steps:
• Log onto Facebook
• Go to the right menu on the app and scroll down to click on ‘Setting and Privacy’.
• Click on ‘Privacy Shortcuts’
• Scroll down to ‘Ad Preferences’ and click on ‘Review your Ad preferences’
• Click on ‘Ad settings’
• Choose your preferences to ‘Not allowed’ for all three Ads

Keep apps in Check

• Over the years you have used Facebook, you must have used the social networking website to log into different applications on your phone which allow said apps to gather data about you. You can delete applications by following these steps:
• Log onto Facebook
• Go to the right menu on the app and scroll down to click on ‘Setting and Privacy’.
• Click on ‘Settings’
• Scroll down to click on ‘Apps and Websites’
• Click on ‘Logged in with Facebook’ and remove all apps and websites you wish to not be logged in with your Facebook account.
• Go back and click on ‘Apps, Websites and Games’ and click on ‘Turn off’ which doesn’t let Facebook interact with other apps.

Deactivate Account

• If you are still paranoid about your privacy, and rightly so, you can choose to deactivate your Facebook account by following these steps:
• Log onto Facebook
• Go to the right menu on the app and scroll down to click on ‘Setting and Privacy’.
• Click on ‘Settings’
• Click on ‘Personal Information’
• Click on ‘Manage Account’ and choose Deactivate.

Active Status

• Facebook has a feature which allows friends to see if and when you were last active on Facebook. You can choose to disable this by following these steps:
• Log onto Facebook
• Go to the right menu on the app and scroll down to click on ‘Setting and Privacy’.
• Click on ‘Settings’
• Scroll down to click on ‘Active Status’
• Toggle “Show when you’re active” to off

Archive content

• In all the years you have been on Facebook there must be posts and photos you have posted which you don’t want others to see. This feature allows you to do exactly that, all archived content on your profile is visible to you and you only. 
• Log onto Facebook
• Open your profile by clicking on your display picture icon.
• Scroll down to the post you want to archive and click on the three dots on the top right
• Click on ‘Archive’

Safety Notices on Messenger

• Facebook recently added a new feature which gives safety notices whilst speaking with a ‘suspicious’ account which in turn helps users avoid potential scammers and child abusers. Luckily this feature is enabled as default so you don’t have to worry about it.

In case you want to bulk delete your posts from Facebook, you can do so by checking out this article. 

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Mayank Sachdeva

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