How can I secure my Facebook account?

Learning about general security for Facebook profiles and pages generally involves working with advanced security settings and features, and understanding the basic settings of this very popular social media platform.

For a basic look at securing Facebook profiles, start with some basic suggestions from the Facebook site itself. These include picking a strong password that can’t be guessed by someone else, and being careful to log out of Facebook when you access it on shared computers. Users should also run anti-virus software on their computers and use firewalls to secure the local network.

In addition, users can look at optional security features offered by the Facebook platform. Users can opt for "active sessions" to make sure they are properly logged out after Facebook use. They can also access "login notifications," which show the user any access to his or her profile. Similarly, "login approvals" can be set up to determine the kinds of input required to access a particular Facebook account. Another, more basic, tip is to change privacy settings to make sure that only friends see personal content, where the default may allow some data to remain public.

Security and privacy experts also counsel users to always think about the effect of sending or sharing data that may end up being distributed to the public Internet. In many cases, personal or secret content is leaked because a secondary user with a Facebook connection takes that data out of social media and posts it on public sites.