More changes at Facebook

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July 15th, 2009 - Posted by Caitlin

Facebook's gradual evolution from private to public continues. The social networking site has begun making status messages, photos and videos visible to the general public, rather than only the user's approved friends. For the present, only certain users, whose profiles are already set as public, will find that their posts are now visible to everyone by default. But since the constant changes to Facebook's privacy settings tend not to be as transparent as users might like or expect, it's worth taking a look at your own account settings and figuring out just how much information you are broadcasting to the entire Internet. Although Facebook's new position is to encourage users to make their information as public as possible, we suggest that you think twice before going that route. You can still keep your profile as private as you'd like, but you'll need to be proactive about it, by actively taking advantage of the privacy options that are available.

Carelessly exposing your personal information can put you at risk of identity theft. To learn more about how to protect your identity on Facebook, check out our Facebook Identity Theft Protection Guide. And if you're interested in learning about identity theft protection services, see our reviews and comparison chart.