Facebook: Want To Keep That Update Private? Go Ahead

Facebook can cause problems for professionals who want to keep in touch with friends while still connecting with current or future employers. Unflattering photos, updates and wall posts on Facebook can be harmful to future job prospects and embarrassing to individuals.

That's why Facebook, the massively popular social network, is updating its privacy features, allowing users to choose who sees specific updates.

Writing in a Facebook blog post yesterday, Olaoluwa Okelola, an employee of Facebook, laid out the changes that are coming to the Publisher feature. Publisher is the page on the social network where users add photos, updates and information.

"The new Publisher has been streamlined a bit, and its most significant improvement is the new Publisher Privacy Control that gives you the opportunity to answer the question, "Who do you want to tell?" as easily as you answer the question, 'What's on your mind,'" wrote Okelola.

Not everyone has access to the beta version of the changes that have come to Facebook's Publisher, but the upshot is that before posting anything to the social network, users will be able to select who in their network sees the updates.

"If you have access to this beta version, every time you publish content into your stream you are able to control which people can access that specific piece of content," explained Okelola.

The choices that Facebook users will have when updating their page include options for everyone to see the message; only allowing friends and people in specific networks to see the updates; friends of friends allows anyone who is friends with a friend to see it; friends only; and, custom, which lets individuals pick and choose who sees the updates.

The goal of Facebook's impending privacy update is to, presumably, allow users of the social network to express themselves more freely while not worrying about whether a future employer, for example, might find pictures they consider to be inappropriate.

Facebook users who have their profile open to everyone are eligible for the beta test of the changes to Publisher. Users who have already implemented some privacy settings -- such as friends and networks or friends only -- are not.