Social Media Privacy
Learn how to use social media safely, manage privacy settings, and avoid the tricks that expose your personal information.
The Privacy Trade-Off of Social Media
Social media — particularly Facebook — has become an essential way to stay connected with family and friends. Seeing photos of grandchildren, keeping up with old friends, and sharing updates about your life brings real joy and reduces isolation. Those benefits are genuine and important.
But there's a trade-off that isn't always obvious: the more you share online, the more information is available to people you didn't intend to share it with.
Who Can See What You Post?
When you put something on Facebook, who sees it depends on your privacy settings. The three main options are:
- Public: Anyone on the internet can see it — even people without Facebook accounts. Search engines can find it.
- Friends: Only people you've accepted as Facebook friends can see it.
- Only Me: Only you can see it.
Many people don't realize their posts are set to "Public" by default or that their privacy settings may have changed after a Facebook update. This means your vacation photos, family updates, and personal opinions may be visible to the entire internet.
What Scammers Learn From Social Media
Information that seems harmless to share can be gold for scammers:
- Your birthday and hometown: Combined with your name, these can be used for identity theft.
- Your pet's name: This is a common password or security question answer.
- Vacation photos posted in real time: These advertise that your home is empty.
- Family relationship details: Knowing your grandchildren's names helps with impersonation scams.
- "I'm grateful for" posts: These often reveal mother's maiden name, first car, high school — all common security question answers.
The Data Harvesting Business
Beyond scammers, there's a broader privacy concern. Social media companies make money by collecting data about you and using it to show you targeted advertising. Every like, share, comment, and click is recorded and analyzed.
This isn't necessarily malicious, but it's worth understanding: on social media, you're not just the user — you're also the product. Your attention and personal data are what the company sells to advertisers.
Finding Your Balance
This doesn't mean you should quit social media. The benefits of connection are real. But understanding the trade-off helps you make informed choices about:
- What you share
- Who can see it
- What information you provide to quizzes and games
- Which friend requests you accept
The rest of this module will give you practical tools to enjoy social media while protecting your privacy.
A Note About Different Platforms
While this module focuses primarily on Facebook (since it's the most popular platform among adults 65+), the same principles apply to Instagram, Twitter/X, TikTok, NextDoor, and any other social platform. The settings may be in different places, but the concepts are the same:
- Control who sees your posts
- Be selective about what you share
- Be cautious about who you connect with
- Understand that everything you post could potentially be seen by anyone