Larry Magid: Facebook's Graph Seach And Privacy

SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS)— Facebook is getting ready to roll out to users its Graph Search feature, but some users may not realize just what that means about what information is being displayed.

The feature was introduced in February and it's being rolled out gradually and globally. I think people are beginning to get it. It allows you to search for people based on the pictures they've been in and other characteristics.

So, it can unearth a lot of information about people, which could be good, but obviously it brings up some privacy issues even though it does not change your privacy settings.

It does make it easier for users to find things that maybe should be a little more private that you hadn't thought about. However, hiding content from your timeline does not necessarily exempt it from Graph Search.

Go to your privacy settings and look at your 'Activity Log' to see what you've posted. I've gone in and looked and have found things (not that they were awful) that I didn't necessarily want my whole audience to see. So you can go in and curate what you have on your page by either making sure it isn't there by deleting it or limiting the number of friends that can see it.

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