Facebook changes privacy settings for newbies

LOS ANGELES — Facebook is tweaking its privacy settings to make it easier for newbies to share their posts privately.

The social network, with over 1.2 billion members, says new sign-ups get confused and end up posting their initial status updates publicly, which is the default setting until you go in and change it.

That's about to change, with new settings that are defaulted to sharing privately with your Facebook friends.

New Facebook members "sometimes feel like their information is more public than they want," says Facebook product manager Mike Nowak. "We've listened and adjusted."

Facebook is also introducing a privacy "checklist," to all Facebook users, with a tool that will "walk you through different privacy choices," and display the various apps that are connected to your Facebook profile.

The new settings will go into effect over the next weeks.

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