Facebookers . . . be aware!

Your Facebook Apps Are Spying on You

Sure, it's silly and fun to play Mafia Wars or to take one of the 2,345,678 quizzes on Facebook. When you install one of these apps, though, it gains access to any information you've designated as available to 'Everyone'. Per Facebook's Platform guidelines, this can include a huge amount of information, including your name, photo, birthday, location, job history, religion, political point of view, relationships, favorite books and movies, and so on. Much of this information is shared by default. It's the motherload for data miners.

Facebook requires each app to adhere to your privacy preferences and to have its own privacy policy, but it doesn't require apps to have a very good policy. Some, like Farmville's policy, are fairly comprehensive; others appear to have been written by 12-year-olds.

The Fix: Facebook recently introduced privacy controls that help limit what information apps can access. Use them. To start, log in and go to Account, Privacy Settings, Profile Information. Change any setting marked ‘Everyone' to Only Friends or Friends of Friends. Then go to Applications and Websites, What your friends can share about you, and uncheck most if not all of the boxes.

Even then, there's some information that Facebook simply won't let you withhold, including your name, profile photo, friends, fan pages, and geographic location, plus the networks you belong to. So think twice before you start harvesting virtual crops or install "Lover of the Day."