Staying on top of Facebook and all of its changes can be handful. We do it for a living and it’s still tough. So, yes, Facebook is changing its privacy settings again.
Some of these features are hitting news feeds now, with others being released in the coming weeks.
“Some people have felt Facebook privacy has changed too much in the past, or we haven’t communicated as well as we could have,” said Facebook product manager Michael Novak. “Now we’re thinking about privacy not just as a set of controls or settings, but as a set of experiences that help people feel comfortable.”
One of the changes is offering you more choices of who you want to share your posts with. It probably won’t matter though seeing as how I have things in my news feed constantly that have no business being there. I’d continue to be careful what I post, regardless of who Facebook is telling me will see it.
Another change is that you’ll be able to hide your old cover photos. Previously, cover photos were public by default.
Part of this new rollout is Facebook being clearer about their privacy policy overall. Let’s be honest, they haven’t been in the past. Unless you stay on top of this stuff (and Facebook will be happy if you don’t), you really don’t know who is seeing your content and why. How many people have never even looked through their privacy settings?
Let’s hope these changes are a good thing and helps users understand their privacy settings so they can know if they should be bragging about winning $200 at the slot machines when people they owe money to can see it.