Social media is a powerful tool and an excellent way to stay in touch with loved ones. You can even remain informed regarding the latest news using social media. However, securing your social media accounts from unauthorized access is quite imperative.

Therefore, you need to understand how to manage your social media account’s security and privacy settings. When you lock down your social media privacy settings, it remains inaccessible to anyone, and the best thing is that your account doesn’t fall into the wrong hands. This blog explains how you can lock down your social media privacy settings.

How to Secure Your Social Media Accounts

Social media privacy settings let you control who can view your posts, contact information, and personal information such as your birthdate, full name, and address. You can protect your digital identity, personal safety, and reputation through strict privacy settings.

Here are a few tips that you can use to secure your social media accounts.

1. Choose The Strong Password

You must use a strong password that no one can easily guess. Never use your birthdate, anniversary, or some common password like “12345”. Your password should contain the right combination of uppercase letters, lowercase letters, numbers, and special characters. Use the unique password for each social media account.

2. Use Two Factor Authentication

2FA or two-factor authentication adds an extra layer of security. Therefore, when someone or even you try to log into your account, it double-checks that you are the person you claim to be. Even if some hacker knows your password, they won’t be able to access your account. You can Google search for information on how to set up 2FA for popular online services like Gmail, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, and Facebook.

3. Be Cautious About What You Post Online

Take some time out and understand your digital footprint. Remember that not everyone who uses social media is the person they claim to be. Therefore, do your homework and check if you know a person and whether or not the friend, follower, or link is genuine. Be careful about the photos, videos, or statuses you update on social media.

Hackers or criminals can use this publicly available information to make phishing messages more convincing or steal your identity. Therefore, when you post something online, change your social media account settings/privacy status to private (limited to your friends). We suggest never sharing any sensitive information, such as your contact details, financial account details, or anything that can harm you on social media.

In short, limit your account visibility to friends only or to the closed circle of trusted contacts.

4. Disable Location Sharing

When you disable the location sharing on social media, you can hide your geolocation. Therefore, no one can see where you are. Many social media networking sites have this feature by default ON. So, don’t forget to disable it when you post photos or any videos/posts on social media.

5. Limit the Personal Data Social Media Sites Can Collect

Many social media sites share data with advertisers. Therefore, take charge of your social media privacy settings and review and control what personal data the social media can collect.

6. Keep Your Children Safe Online with Parental Control

You can set parental control if you want to protect your kids from adult content or online hackers. Many social media platforms offer privacy settings that can help you block access to certain pages/features, such as when chatting with strangers.

7. Don’t Accept Friend Requests From Unknown

Be mindful about accepting friend requests. If you don’t know a person, don’t accept friend requests. Sometimes, strangers are not just strangers; they have created fake accounts to gather information or engage in cybercrime. Sometimes, the account is created to spread rumours or false information.

8. Don’t Post Everything Online

Remember that whatever information you post on the internet will remain forever, whether your social media profile is private or you are using an app with disappearing messages. Whatever you will post will remain forever on the internet. Therefore, don’t post it if you don’t want this to happen.

Besides all these, here are some social media privacy settings tips that you need to follow to protect your account.

•       Don’t give access to third-party apps.
•       Check your social media network’s data collection policy.
•       From time to time, clean up your friend lists and remove them if you find some stranger or unauthorized person.
•       You can use the block function to protect yourself from any unwanted followers, spam accounts, and interactions.

Closing Thoughts

Hopefully, the above-discussed tricks and tips will help you protect your privacy on social media accounts. Remember, your public social media profile is not only a risk to your privacy but also an opportunity for hackers and scammers to make you a victim. So, limit who can view your post online, who can contact you, and how much data the social media platform can collect and share to remain safe and sound.