Tips For Safely Navigating Facebook

According Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at security firm Sophos, there are ways employees can use social networking sites such as Facebook more safely. "If workers are allowed to be given access to these sites then it's imperative that they are taught best practices to ensure that they are not putting their personal and corporate data at risk," he says. "Five minutes spent learning the ins-and-outs of Facebook's privacy settings, for instance, could save a lot of heartache later."

If you do use Facebook -- or other social networking sites -- here are a few security tops from Sophos:

1. Adjust Facebook privacy settings to help protect your identity
2. Think carefully about who you allow to become your friend Once you have accepted someone as your friend they will be able to access any information about you (including photographs) that you have marked as viewable by your friends. You can remove friends at any time should you change your mind about someone.
3. Show "limited friends" a cut-down version of your profile You can choose to make people 'limited friends' who only have access to a cut-down version of your profile if you wish. This can be useful if you have associates who you do not wish to give full friend status to, or feel uncomfortable sharing personal information with.
4. Disable options, then open them one by one Think about how you want to use Facebook. If it's only to keep in touch with people and be able to contact them then maybe it's better to turn off the bells and whistles. It makes a lot of sense to disable an option until you have decided you do want and need it, rather than start with everything accessible.