Facebook Isn’t Your Only Privacy Worry

How many of you are using Yahoo?  I’m not talking about the search engine, which I rarely use for anything.  I’m talking about Yahoo mail, which I do use, and YahooGroups, which is an invaluable tool for me these days.  I run, and participate in, over 30 YahooGroups.  It’s an easy, web-based listserv system that most users of all levels can understand and use easily.  I also still use Yahoo Instant Messenger on a daily basis.  Groups and Messenger are the main reasons I want do not wnat Yahoo to die.

Anyway, did you know that they are getting ready to change their privacy details to start allowing a measure of “sharing” that they have not done in the past?  Following the lead of Digg, Facebook, and others, they are allowing automatic “sharing” of statuses and activities unless you turn it off.  The only thing different about how they are doing it and how Facebook did it is that they are doing their best to inform users ahead of time of the change, and making it easy to turn off the automatic sharing.  I have seen several announcements about it, and now a glut of news articles trying to get the word out about the Yahoo privacy functions to its users so there is no “I’ve been violated” pushback from users when the sharing change happens in a few days.

If you have a Yahoo account, you can turn off the sharing function easily using any ONE of the following steps:

• From Mail.Yahoo.com:  log into your mail account, click on Options, Mail Options (upper right corner).  Deselect the check in the “Enable Updates” checkbox, save changes, and you’re good to go.
• From the Yahoo.com Home Page:  log into your account.  Click on profile, then the update tab, then the manage my updates sub-tab.  Deselect the “Enable Updates” checkbox, save changes, and you’re good to go.
• From My.Yahoo.com:  log into your account.  Click on your name in the upper right-hand corner, which will bring up your profile.  Choose the update tab, then the manage my updates sub-tab.  Deselect the “enable Updates” checkbox, save changes, and you’re good to go.
• From Groups.Yahoo.com: log into your account.  Click on your name in the upper right-hand corner, which will bring up your profile.  Choose the update tab, then manage my updates sub-tab.  Deselect “enable Updates” checkbox, save changes, and you’re good to go.
• From your Yahoo Instant Messenger Window:  log in, then choose Messenger, Privacy Options.  Near the bottom of the window, click on Manage the Updates I Broadcast, which will load the updates/manage my updates sub-tab in your browser window.  Deselect the Enable Updates” checkbox, save changes, and you’re good to go.