How to Review and Tighten Your Facebook Privacy Settings

Facebook's default settings are designed for sharing, not for privacy. When you first create an account, many things — your posts, your friend list, your phone number — may be visible to strangers, not only your friends. Changing these settings takes about 10 minutes and makes a meaningful difference in who can see your information.

Facebook actually has a built-in tool called Privacy Checkup that walks you through the most important settings. To find it: tap the three horizontal lines (menu) on your phone, go to Settings & Privacy, then tap Privacy Checkup. It walks you through five categories: who can see your posts, how people find you, data from other apps, ad settings, and profile information.

The most important setting to change is who can see your future posts. The default is often "Friends," but older accounts may still be set to "Public." In Privacy Checkup, change your default audience to "Friends" so strangers cannot see what you post.

Your phone number and email address deserve protection too. In Privacy Checkup or Settings > Privacy > Your Facebook Information, set "Who can look you up using your phone number" to "Friends of Friends" or "Only Me." The same goes for your email address.

Your friends list is often public by default, which lets strangers see everyone you know — useful information for scammers. Go to your profile, tap Friends, then tap the pencil icon to set your friends list visibility to "Only Me" or "Friends."

Off-Facebook Activity is a lesser-known setting that reveals how many websites and apps share your browsing data with Facebook. Go to Settings > Your Facebook Information > Off-Facebook Activity to review this list. You can clear your history and limit future tracking.

For ad personalization, go to Settings > Ads > Ad Settings. Here you can reduce how much Facebook uses your data to target ads — including data from data brokers and your activity off Facebook.

Third-party apps connected to your Facebook account can read your profile and post on your behalf. Go to Settings > Apps and Websites to see the full list. Remove any app you no longer use.

Two-factor authentication is critical. Go to Settings > Security and Login > Two-Factor Authentication and turn it on using your phone number or an authenticator app.

Finally, you can download everything Facebook has stored about you. Go to Settings > Your Facebook Information > Download Your Information to request a full copy. This shows you exactly what data Facebook holds.