What is public information?
Something that’s public can be seen by anyone. That includes people who aren’t your friends, people off of Facebook and people who use different media such as print, broadcast (ex: television) and other sites on the Internet. For example, if you use our services to provide a real-time public comment to a television show, that may appear on the show or elsewhere on Facebook.
What information is public?
Information you share that is always public: Some of the information you give us when you fill out your profile is public, such as your age range, language and country. We also use a part of your profile, called your Public Profile, to help connect you with friends and family. Your Public Profile includes your name, gender, username and user ID (account number), profile picture, cover photo and networks. This info is also public. Some of the ways this helps us connect you are:
- Your name, profile picture and cover photo help people recognize you
- Gender helps us describe you (ex: "Add her as a friend")
- Listing your networks (ex: school, workplace) allows others to find you more easily
- Username and user ID (ex: your account number) are in the URL of your profile
- Age range helps provide you with age-appropriate content
- Language and country help us provide appropriate content and experiences
Information you share publicly: When you choose to share something with Public (ex: when you select Public from the audience selector), it’s considered public information. If you share something and you don’t see an audience selector or another privacy setting, that information is also public. Learn more about using the audience selector to control who you share with when you post to Facebook.
Stuff other people share: If other people share info about you, even if it’s something you shared with them but did not make public, they can choose to make it public. Also when you comment on other people’s public posts, your comment is public as well.
Posts on Facebook Pages or public groups: Facebook Pages and public groups are public spaces. Anyone who can see the Page or group can see your post or comment. Generally, when you post or comment on a Page or to a public group, a story can be published in News Feed as well as other places on or off Facebook.
Remember that public information can:
- Be associated with you, even off Facebook
- Show up when someone does a search on Facebook or on another search engine
- Be accessible to Facebook-integrated games, applications and websites you and your friends use
- Be accessible to anyone who uses our APIs, such as our Graph API
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