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Facebook says privacy settings are easy to use

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Facebook’s privacy settings are easy to use.

So says Facebook’s Chief Technology Officer Bret Taylor.

The proof? The majority of people on Facebook have modified their privacy settings, Taylor told the audience at San Francisco’s Web 2.0 Summit Wednesday.

(Everyone who has inadvertently made drunken fraternity or sorority pictures visible to grandma and grandpa should speak up now or forever hold their peace).

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Taylor did not specify what percentage of Facebook’s users have done so. But that’s a big increase from the old stat that Facebook used to trot out that only 15% to 20% of its users had modified their settings.

Taylor says today’s Facebook users, some 800 million of them, are a savvy lot when it comes to shielding their privacy.

‘If you talk to college students they know what their parents can see, they know what their ex-boyfriend or ex-girlfriend can see,’ Taylor said.

He also pointed to the company’s introduction of an ‘activity log’ that shows all the information you have shared on Facebook. (You can read more about the activity log in this piece).

The guiding principle on privacy at Facebook? ‘If we can make your privacy controls transparent it will naturally lead to people sharing more,’ Taylor said.

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-- Jessica Guynn

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