Protect your Facebook in 5 Easy Steps

Recently I have been thinking quite a bit about the information that I share with others on Facebook.

If you are like me there are photo’s of your children, grandchildren and other members of your immediate and extended family. Mrs. Cobos like most of the women I know shares her maiden name so that her old school chums can find her.

Fifty-two percent of Millennials are on their social network of choice several times a day, leaving 18 percent of users exposed to malware, the study found – Jacques Erasmus Ex-Hacker Turned Internet Security Adviser

My facebook is connected with my mom and even grandmother and in laws. If you are like me you may have shared information about an upcoming vacation, your home phone or pictures of your vegetable garden. Like me you’ve probably even shared your cell phone so that your friends can reach you. All of which is invaluable information to Identity Thieves maybe even more so than your account numbers and corresponding passwords.

The last time I called my bank, Credit Card Company or Cell Phone provider I was asked to provide answers to security “challenge questions” in order to gain access to my account or information. A lot of those answers could be easily gleaned from hacking into my Facebook page. This got me thinking and in the process I stumbled upon an article in the Wall Street Journal about a free software add-on for Mozilla’s Firefox Web Browser that enables its user to capture passwords and user names across open WiFi networks just like the one you use to access the Internet at your favorite java house.

50 percent of them have security settings installed and only 8 percent have never viewed their privacy controls, down from 37 percent in 2009- Jacques Erasmus

One way to protect the personal information you have chosen to share on Facebook is to change your security settings to require your facebook browsing sessions to be encrypted like when you conduct online banking so that the address appears as https://www.facebook.com/  {the S if the HTTP portion of the address stands for SECURE).

This simple slideshow demonstrates how to correct this security flaw  in 5 easy steps that should take you no more than two minutes tops. If you Liked the tip, show me some love on my Facebook Fan Page!

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