Facebook Privacy Settings Now More Important

As a parent of a teen on Facebook, I've been happy with the privacy controls that allow teens to keep their profiles private and to invite only friends and family they want into their network.

So parents and teens should be aware that Facebook will begin notifying members that they can choose to either keep their listings private or to allow Facebook to make their name and profile picture available to outsiders who search for names on the site. The biggest change is that the Palo Alto, Calif.-based site will allow search engine sites including Yahoo! and Google to index its public member profiles. Not a small change for teens who want to keep their profiles visible to only Facebook members.

Only profiles of members over age 18 will be shown in the search engines, Facebook says. And profiles need to be set to be seen by "everyone" for limited profiles to appear on search pages. 

Facebook has undergone many big changes this year as it has grown to 39 million members, up 62.5 percent from 24 million in May. Parents, now is a good time to check in with your kids about the privacy settings they have chosen to make sure your teens have their privacy options set the way they—and you—want them.

LINK: Facebook lets users choose to publicize themselves [Reuters]

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