# My Facebook Setup

By [Continuations](https://continuations.com) · 2011-09-26

facebook, privacy

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Following f8, there has been a new explosion of discussion around Facebook’s voracious data gathering.  For instance, Facebook keeps cookies on your machine [even when you are logged out](http://nikcub.appspot.com/logging-out-of-facebook-is-not-enough) which allows them at least in principle to track your visits to sites with Facebook social plugins.  Add to that the Ticker, which is really just [Beacon](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook_Beacon) redux with better timing and some semblance of an opt-in, and you have a ton of data on your activities on the web flowing to Facebook.  Since I have been bothered by this for [some time](http://continuations.com/post/967075502/privacy-and-facebooks-widgets), I have come up with a setup that makes me feel more in control.

Before describing the setup, I should point out that I don’t really use Facebook actively other than (a) to sign into some sites that require it (eg canv.as) and (b) respond to the occasional Facebook message from a friend.  I am happy to use individual services which together work better for me than Facebook (Tumblr, Twitter, Foursquare, Kik - it is not by accident that USV is an investor in these).  So if you are a super active user of Facebook, the following may not really work for you.

First, I periodically visit the settings page in Facebook and make sure that I am opted out of features such as instant personalization or letting people automatically add stuff to my profile through tagging.  I do this periodically because as Facebook’s service evolves they are changing the settings accordingly (this is not a criticism, simply a statement of fact and over time they have actually simplified the controls).  Second, I use multiple browsers.  I use Chrome as my workhorse and have gmail, gcal, twitter, tumblr open in it at all times.  I use Firefox for most of the services that I try out and this is where I  tend to be logged into Facebook.  Finally, I use Safari in private mode and have cleared all cookies.  Any and all personal browsing and  transactions take place through Safari.

While this may seem like overkill, I find that it not only lets me be less concerned about Facebook’s data gathering but also I wind up having just enough tabs open in each browser that I can readily navigate.  On the Mac, Alt Tab switching makes going back and forth between the three a breeze.  The only occasional hold up occurs if I run across a URL in one browser that I want in another which then requires a quick copy and paste.

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*Originally published on [Continuations](https://continuations.com/my-facebook-setup)*