Lockwell

Control who sees you on social media

Decide who can see your posts, your profile and where you are, in the apps you already use.

  • 40 min
  • 8 steps
  • Reviewed

What you post on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok can reach far more people than you meant, including strangers and scammers who use personal details to sound convincing. This guide sets who sees what. Do the two Essential items in each app you use. Meta is renaming Accounts Center to Meta Account, so you may see either name. The steps follow Meta's and TikTok's help pages for Android; on iPhone the Menu button may sit in a different corner.

Essential

Privacy settings don't help if someone else can sign in to your account. Turn on two-step verification in each app and keep the recovery codes somewhere safe.

Facebook and Instagram

  1. Follow Turn on two-step verification: it covers both apps and explains which method to choose.
  2. Check where you are signed in: see Sign out of devices you don't recognise.

TikTok

  1. Tap Profile, then the menu ☰, then Settings and privacy → Security & permissions → 2-step verification.
  2. Choose at least two methods, an authenticator app among them if you can, and tap Turn on.
  3. In Security & permissions → Manage devices, delete any device you don't recognise, then change your password.
Essential

On Facebook, the audience you set in the settings applies to every new post; reels and stories have their own audience setting. On Instagram and TikTok, a private account means you approve who follows you and sees your posts. Whoever can see a post can still take a screenshot and pass it on.

Facebook

  1. Tap Menu → Settings & privacy → Settings.
  2. Under Audience and visibility, tap Posts and set who can see your future posts to Friends.
  3. When you write a post, the audience button under your name changes it for that post only.

Instagram

  1. Go to your profile and tap Menu at the top right.
  2. Under Who can see your content, tap Account privacy, turn on Private account and tap Switch to private.
  3. Business accounts can't be made private.

TikTok

  1. Tap Profile, then ☰, then Settings and privacy → Privacy, and turn on Private account.
  2. When you post, tap Settings at the top of the preview screen to choose who can see that post.
Recommended

Your phone number, email and birthday help scammers sound convincing and help strangers find you elsewhere. Show them only to yourself or your friends. Facebook shows your friends list to everyone unless you change it.

Facebook

  1. Go to your profile, tap Edit profile, scroll to Contact Info and tap Edit.
  2. For your phone number, tap Manage contact info and choose a smaller audience, such as Only me. For an email address, tap Manage contact info, tap your profile name, then Change visibility on Facebook.
  3. Under Personal details, tap Edit next to your birthday and choose who can see the date and the year.
  4. In Settings → Audience and visibility → How people find and contact you, set Who can see your friends list? to Friends or Only me. A friend whose own list is public can still show that you are friends.
Recommended

Apps suggest your profile to people who have your number or email in their contacts. That is how a stranger who knows your number can find your profile. Turning this off reduces suggestions but doesn't end them: apps also suggest people based on mutual friends and other activity.

Facebook

  1. Tap Menu → Settings & privacy → Settings, then How people find and contact you under Audience and visibility.
  2. Set People with your email address and People with your phone number to Friends or No one. Facebook's default is Possible Connections.

Instagram

  1. Instagram has no setting that stops it suggesting you to people who have your number or email saved. These steps only stop it using your own address book.
  2. Tap Menu → Meta Account → Your Information and Permissions → Upload Contacts, turn off Connect Contacts and tap Disconnect. Do it on every device where you use Instagram.
  3. This doesn't delete contacts you uploaded before. To delete them, open Instagram in a web browser and go to Edit profile → See more in Meta Account → Your information and permissions → Manage Contacts → Delete all. Deleting can take up to 90 days.
  4. In the same browser, on Edit profile, turn off Show account suggestions on profiles and click Submit. This setting is not in the app.

TikTok

  1. Tap Settings and privacy → Privacy → Suggest your account to others and turn off Contacts, Facebook friends and People who open or send links to you.
  2. In Privacy → Sync contacts and Facebook friends, turn off both, then tap Remove previously synced contacts.
Recommended

Other people can tag you in photos and posts, which shows you to their audience. Review settings decide what appears on your profile; they don't stop people tagging you. A tagged post you hide from your profile is still visible to its audience in other places, such as Feed and Search.

Facebook

  1. Tap Menu → Settings & privacy → Settings, then Profile and tagging under Audience and visibility.
  2. Turn on Review posts you're tagged in before the post appears on your profile?
  3. Turn on Review tags people add to your posts before the tags appear on Facebook?

Instagram

  1. Go to your profile and tap Menu.
  2. Under How others can interact with you, tap Tags and mentions, turn on Manually approve tags and tap Turn on.

TikTok

  1. Tap Settings and privacy → Privacy → Mentions and tags → Mentions.
  2. Choose People you follow, Friends or No one.
Recommended

A place in a post or a live map can show where you live, work or are right now. Friends can give your location away too, by tagging you or posting a photo of you; ask them not to. TikTok still estimates your rough location from your SIM card and internet connection, even with location access turned off.

Facebook

  1. Limit Facebook's access to your location in your phone's settings: see Check what your apps can access.
  2. When you post, don't add a place.

Instagram

  1. Tap Messages, then Map at the top, then Settings at the top right, choose not to share your location with anyone, and tap Share Location to save. It is off unless you turned it on. This doesn't stop Instagram reading your phone's location: limit that in your phone's settings, as for Facebook.
  2. Don't add a location to posts and stories you don't want tied to a place.

TikTok

  1. Tap Settings and privacy → Privacy → Location Services, if you see it, and choose not to give TikTok your location.
  2. In the same menu, tap Delete certain location data. TikTok may still keep a rough location, such as your city.
Advanced

Years of old public posts can be read by anyone and pieced together. You can narrow them in one go on Facebook; on Instagram and TikTok, you go post by post or in batches.

Facebook

  1. Tap Menu → Settings & privacy → Settings, then Posts under Audience and visibility.
  2. Tap View next to Limit who can see past posts, then Limit past posts, and confirm.
  3. Your old public posts become visible to Friends only. You can't undo this in one step. Posts with a custom audience and posts others tagged you in are not affected. Anyone you tagged in a post, and their friends, can still see it.

Instagram

  1. To hide one post, open it, tap Options at the top right and choose Archive. Only you can see archived posts, and you can restore them.
  2. To archive many at once, tap Menu → Your activity, then Posts under Content you shared, tap Select, choose the posts and tap Archive.

TikTok

  1. Open a post on your profile, tap More options at the side, then Privacy settings (you may need to swipe left).
  2. Choose Friends or Only you. TikTok's help page describes no way to change many posts at once.
Advanced

Meta and TikTok choose ads from what you do in their apps, and also from what other companies tell them about you. You can reduce the second part; you can't turn ads off.

Facebook and Instagram

  1. In Facebook, tap Menu → Settings & privacy → Settings → Meta Account → Your information and permissions → Activity from other businesses. In Instagram, tap Menu → Meta Account and go on from Your information and permissions. Choose not to see ads based on this activity. It applies to both apps. Companies may still send Meta your activity, and ads can still come from customer lists that businesses upload.
  2. In Meta Account → Ad preferences, look through Customize ads and Manage info.

TikTok

  1. Tap Settings and privacy → Ads and turn off ads based on data from advertising partners.
  2. TikTok still shows you ads based on what you do on TikTok.