We all enjoy keeping up with friends and family on social media, but we have to be mindful of our privacy and security when we do. Here are some suggestions to help keep your personal information private:

1. Understand what information the site needs for your account and how they use it in the first place.

Never give more information than is necessary to operate an account. Usually this includes:

• an email: Never use a work email address; consider creating a separate one for social media sites
• username
• password
• If your birthday is required, consider using a nonsense date like January 1st 1904: Your real birth date is tied to important IDs, like your driver’s license, social security number, or passport

2. Make sure that your posts are not indexed into search engines.

• Each social media site handles this in a different way. For example, you can use your Facebook settings to block search engine indexing, or on Twitter you can make your posts visible to people who follow you only

3. Remember to set all your posts private on Instagram so only friends can see them and, of course, be cautious of what you post on any social media site.

• Just because you can post it doesn’t mean that you should

4. Make sure that mobile apps for social media sites are not using personal data or sharing additional private information.

• You should also use caution when linking together different apps like Facebook and Twitter or news apps like Flipboard and Facebook

5. Social media are always refining and changing their privacy settings.

If you want help editing these settings, use a product like Trend Micro Security, which provides a privacy scan of social networks like Facebook, Google+, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

• This easy-to-use application allows you to review and set all your social network privacy preferences from a single screen.
  

Using these five tips can help insure your privacy online and make social media a safer place.

Watch the video: Social Media Privacy Settings

Please add your thoughts in the comments below or follow me on Twitter: @rik_ferguson.