I know some people have become really wary about FaceBook’s privacy issues. Personally, I believe if you are NOT posting drunken pictures of yourself and NOT giving out your address to everyone, you don’t have too much to worry about. This tutorial focuses more on privacy control with the people you add as “friends” on FaceBook.

Sometimes people blindly add anyone as their “friend” even if they don’t know the person too well or even at all. You may want to be careful about this because as your “friend” they will be able to see almost everything on your FaceBook, including pictures, status updates, wall posts to friends, and other personal information. It’s been a trend recently for students to add their past teachers and some family members. These are also people you may want to be careful about. Although you could easily solve this problem by just being careful and censored on the Internet in general, there is another option.

We can turn to the “Limited Profile” feature of FaceBook. This basically lets you control who sees what from you. You can put certain people on the Limited Profile list and prevent them from seeing specific things from you, or you can also limit what one particular person sees. FaceBook has changed their layout more than enough times and even though I’ve been using it for a few years, I still had trouble finding the option again, so I decided to write a little tutorial on this. Hopefully this tutorial will stay relevant for more than two weeks.

Step 1: First, let’s set up the Limited Profile list, shall we? In the upper-right hand corner click Account and then select Edit Friends.

Step 1

Step 2: You will see a sidebar on the left. Select Friends under Lists.

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Step 3: At the top of the page next to the search bar, you’ll see a couple of buttons. Using these, you can create a new list, edit a list, or delete a list. If you don’t have one already, create a “Limited Profile” list.

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Step 4: Now you can edit the list and add any friends to the list.

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Step 5: So now we have the Limited Profile list established. Next we want to control what people on this list will see from you. In the upper-right hand corner of your FaceBook page, click Account and then click Privacy Settings.

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Step 6: Click on Customize settings.

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Step 7: Now you will see a whole list of things, such as “Things I share,” “Things others share,” and “Contact information.” Next to each feature you will have the option to customize what people will see. You have the option of the typical “Everyone,” “Friends and Networks,” “Friends of Friends,” and “Friends Only,” but you can also pick “Custom” which is where you can have more control. So click “Custom” and a small window will pop up.

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Step 8: At the bottom of the window you can choose to hide the feature from anyone you want. It can be a specific person or the “Limited Profile” list, which will include all of the people you added to this list earlier.

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Step 9: And finally, how do we put people on the “Limited Profile” list when you first add them as your friend? When you add a friend or accept a friend request, you can put the person on the Limited Profile list immediately. It is very simple and you do not need to go through the earlier steps again. All you have to do is click “Add to List” and then pick “Limited Profile.”

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There you go! Now you will have more control over what people see on your profile and what information you send out.

Also, when you are at the “Customize settings” page, you will notice a “Preview My Profile” button at the top right corner. You can click this and type in the name of one of your friends to see exactly how they will see your profile.

Remember, even with the Limited Profile trick, it’s probably best not to post anything up that would ruin your life if the wrong person saw it.