In December I wrote an article about how to use Facebook without publishing your personal data on the World Wide Web. (http://bit.ly/8Gb4O0) Since then I have been trying to get into my wife’s account, to prove the privacy settings of Facebook cannot be trusted. My wife has configured her settings so strict that she and her publications are only visible to friends, the highest privacy level in Facebook. No matter what I did, I could neither find a trace of her nor her publications anywhere. As far as non-friends are concerned she does not exist on Facebook.
However, yesterday it finally dawned on me: Retweets! Your own publications are save as long as you configure your account correctly, but as soon as one of your inner circle friends decides to re-publish your comment, photo, video or whatever you were doing on their own Wall, it can become publicly accesible. It al depends on your friends settings and their friends settings and etc. etc. Even if you try virtual suicide (a company that removes all your stuff from Facebook for you if you decide so), your photos and videos that have been re-published are still out there and might come to haunt you in years from now.
As I said before: Anything you write or publish, that leaves your computer through an Internet connection, no matter where or how you publish it, can become public property. So, before hitting the publish or mail send button, think one more time: Would you mind if this material would appear on the front page of your national newspaper?!
