As I was researching a post on hiding your likes from the new-ish Facebook Timeline, I came across a little Facebook secret. It’s a bit like an Easter Egg but it’s not totally hidden. You can see it but just for a fraction of a second. As of this moment on May 11, 2012, the link is just a flash on the screen. Lucky for our readers, my hand is about as quick as my eye. Here are the steps to see the secret link that Facebook, for some reason, wants to keep hidden from its users:
1. Go to Account Settings (top right, click the down arrow to the right of Home and choose Account Settings).
2. Click the Edit your Timeline on the left side of the screen, at the very bottom of the left column. Here is what you are looking for:
Click on 'your Timeline' to edit your preferences.
3. Close the default open Basic Info box by clicking cancel or Save, if everything there is as you want it.
4. Click on the down arrow to the right of the word About and choose Timeline, as shown here:
Click the word Timeline to edit your preferences.
5. You’re almost there. Click on the words ‘Activity log’. Watch the top of the next page very carefully. As the page is loading, you will see the following link appear then disappear:
This line appears only for a fraction of a second before it disappears.
6. Depending on your Internet connection, the time that this menu appears may vary. If you’re lucky, or quick, you can click on the words ‘Learn More’ and find information about how to edit your own Timeline to share or not share some items. In case you are slow, here is the link:
7. As you click your way through the following menu, the hidden link will appear for a very short time then disappear. Here is the menu which shows the link:
Here is everything you can share on Facebook. Edit each one to your preferences.
While this may be a glitch in the Facebook page coding system, I have used three browsers in researching this anomaly and each one has shown the link for only a fraction of a second.
Why would Facebook hide this link from its users? As I said, it’s either a glitch or it’s done on purpose. If it is done on purpose, then it might be because editing your shares, likes, subscriptions, Etc., defeats the purpose of Facebook. Facebook is all about sharing, right? If you can hide some or all of the things you interact with, what fun would Facebook be? Well, that’s their own point of view, perhaps, but we all know that Facebook wants to know EVERYTHING about you. First, they make it tough to find this activity page, and second, they only display the link to their own help page for an extremely short time. This virtually insures that it’s all out there, everything you do while you’re on Facebook. Well, thanks to Computers Made Simple, you can take control of your own timeline, no matter how hard Facebook tries to make it.
TIP: Please read the words just above this. Facebook is constantly changing. Please take the link to our more recent post: This is the NOT latest way to hide your likes from your Facebook timeline. We wrote about this a few months ago but Facebook has changed since then. One of my readers pointed out that the old way of hiding your likes doesn’t work now.
TIP: The word ‘like’ here means public pages that you click ‘Like’ on in Facebook or Subscriptions that you’ve chosen. If you click ‘Like’ on some hot guy or girl’s public page, you can hide that from your timeline. Unfortunately, if you click ‘Like’ on one of the photos or videos on that same page, everyone will know about it. You can hide the pages you like but you can’t hide the fact that you ‘liked’ a photo or something else that someone has shared. Get it? The only way to hide your individual photo likes is to ‘unlike’ them.
Here’s how you can do it as of May 2012:
1. Go to your profile page, as opposed to your HOME page. Click on your own name up on the right side of your screen.
2. Now is a good time to see what your friends can see. Click on the small arrow just to the right of Update Info/Activity Log. Click on the words View As. Your profile will load again but this time you will see these words at the top: ”
This is how your Timeline looks to the public.
Use this tool to see how your Timeline appears to a specific friend or the public. Remember: you can always change who can see any post that appears on your Timeline.”
Just below these words you’ll see a space where you can ‘Enter a friend’s name’. Pick any friend and you’ll be able to see what they can see. If there are things that you want to hide, follow these steps. Oh, keep that page open. When you make changes, hit reload on this page and you’ll see the new, updated settings as your friend sees them. Right click your name and choose ‘open in new tab’. That way you can work on one tab and check your changes in the other.
3. On the new page that you’ve opened up, on the very top right, click on the down arrow and choose ‘Account Settings’. Once you’re at that page, look for these words on the bottom of the left column: ‘You can also visit your privacy settings or edit your Timeline to control who sees the info there.’
4. Click on the words ‘your Timeline’.
5. An editable version of your profile page will come up next, with your basic info already open. Make sure you are sharing only the things you want to share there, then close it down. Check the settings in the other areas such as Work and Education, Contact Info (do people really need to know your email address?), etc. This is where you can edit your ‘Favorite quotations’ or the ‘About you’ section, as well.
6. On the top left to the right of your name, you’ll see the word ‘About’ followed by a down arrow. This tells you that you are on the “About’ page, the arrow indicates that there is more to edit. Click on the arrow and choose Timeline. This is where we’ll hide our likes from the Facebook Timeline.
7. Once your page reloads, you’ll see your profile page again, this time with places where you can edit what you share and what you don’t. Around the middle of the page, you’ll see the words ‘Activity Log’. Click there.
8. Once you click on ‘Activity Log’, all of your current activity is shown. You can sort through these one by one, choosing to share it with some people, none or hide it from your timeline completely. The only thing you can’t stop from being shared is your ‘likes’ on photos or videos, individual items in other words. All you can do with these is to ‘unlike’ them.
9. Up on the top right, you’ll see the word ‘All’ with a down arrow to the right of it. Clicking on that will make a menu scroll down that contains all of the available activities. Here is what is looks like:
This is where you can edit each thing you want to share.
10. Clicking on each word brings up that set of activities in its own timeline. Here you can hide each one, depending on who you want to share things with. Maybe you want to share some of the pages you like but not others. Here is where you can scroll through them and choose who sees what. Beside each Public Page or Public Figure you’ll see a small circle. Click on that circle and choose either ‘Allowed on Timeline’ or ‘Hidden from Timeline.’ You can also choose to Unlike that page which will, of course, keep it off your Timeline.
11. Sort your way through all of the activities that are presented in the menu shown above. You can hide the fact that you have befriended someone, for instance, or you can actually highlight that fact, for some reason. You can also ‘unlike’ or ‘unfriend’ from this menu. As for Subscriptions, you can hide them also. At some point in the future I will go through all of these choices one by one but, for now, see what’s here and choose what you want to share and what you want to hide.
Thanks for reading!
TIP: I’ve just discovered a hidden menu in Facebook. My next post will be about that. If you’re asking yourself, “Why doesn’t Facebook tell me how to hide my likes on my Timeline?”, my next post will give you the answer. Facebook does tell you how to do it. They just hide the link!
PLEASE NOTE: This method is no longer valid. Please take the link to our latest update on this topic. Facebook has changed their Timeline editing system. Here is the link:
I like many diverse things on Facebook, some of which wouldn’t fit in with some of my friend’s sensibilities. There is no reason why everything I like has to be open for my friends to see. Here’s how to hide these likes from your friends.
TIP: This only applies to the new Timeline feature of Facebook. If you’re still on the old Facebook interface, this doesn’t apply to you.
Step One: Navigate to your own profile. Simply click on your name up on the top of your browser window, right beside the little icon which is your profile pic.
Step Two: On the far right of the word Home , you’ll see an arrow pointing down. Click it and you’ll see Account Settings. Click Account Settings to bring up General Account Settings. Basically, that’s your name, your username, email etc.
Step Three: On the left side, under the word facebook , you’ll see the words General, Security, Notifications, Apps, Mobile, Payments and Facebook Ads. Go through each of them, if you want, but what we are looking for now is the little blurb at the bottom. This is what it looks like:
Click on ‘edit your timeline’ to bring up an editable version of your timeline.
Step Four: Click the word timeline to bring up a non-graphical version of everything on your timeline. Again, you can view these settings page by page. The initial one is About you. You can edit and show/hide any portion of your information. How? Look for this icon:
Click on the ‘world’ icon to change your settings.
Your icon, if you haven’t set it already, will be the globe one. Mine is the two headed friends icon. Here is where you decide what to hide from the public, from your friends or, by using the custom setting, some of your friends.
Step Five: Right beside your name on the upper left, where it says About now, click on the little down arrow to show this menu:
This is where you choose what to edit.
What we’re doing now is editing the Likes part of your timeline so click it. Adjust the others according to your personal tastes.
Step Six: Once you click Likes, you’ll be presented with a rather blank page, depending on how much you like . The next step involves a hover button. A hover button is hidden unless you hover your mouse over it. Move your mouse around the Favorites section. It’s all white and you’re looking up on the top right. This is how it looks:
Hover your mouse in the white area to bring up the edit button.
Click the Edit button to, finally, edit your likes.
Step Seven: You’re almost there, don’t get discouraged. Clicking on the edit button in the previous step brings up an editable page for all of your likes. Clicking on the down arrow to the right of the globe icon, you can hide some, all or none of them. Down near the bottom is the Other Pages You Like section. This is how it looks:
I’ve hidden my pages likes so only I can see them.
You’ll recognize the icon of the globe just to the right of the Other Pages You Like words. This is how you can adjust your settings according to your tastes. As you can see, I hid my page likes from everyone, except myself, of course. You can fine tune this setting to eliminate a few of your friends, too, by setting things up in the Custom section that you see fourth from the top.
There isn’t any reason that I can see to share all of the pages that I like. My tastes aren’t totally diverse from the norm but maybe I’m a rock musician and I happen to like Celine Dion’s Facebook page. How would that go over? I’m sure you can see why someone would want to cover up some of their likes. Now you know how to do it!
Thanks for reading. Questions and comments are welcome.
On January 31st, 2012, you’ll be forced to accept Facebook’s new timeline profile. There are some new privacy settings that you might want to adjust. In the change from the standard Facebook interface to the new timeline interface, your previous settings won’t survive the transition. You’ll have to adjust them again.
Why is this important? For me, it’s not. For you, if you are a teenager or a single woman, for example, there are dangers to having all of your activities past and present open to the world. Ex-partners, teachers, prospective employers can now access all of your past information very easily. There isn’t much danger of me being stalked but for many people, that is a very distinct possibility.
TIP: The best thing about the new timeline interface is that you can see immediately how your profile looks to strangers or to any of your friends. See the little arrow just to the right of the gear icon on your profile page? Here it is:
Click on the View As line.
Once you click on the ‘View As’ line, your profile will change to show how strangers will see it. You can then change the view to show how your friends will see it, depending on your settings for each of them. You may want to hide things from some friends. In that case they will not see the same profile as everyone else.
Step 1 – Hide Your Past from Strangers: Follow these steps to ‘Limit the Audience for Past Posts: https://brianmahoney.ca/2011/09/facebook-control-your-old-post-privacy/ You must do this again, even though you may have done this in the past. Once you have done this, take a look at your profile as I have described just above this to ensure that your past is hidden from strangers/people who aren’t your friend.
Step 2 – Hide Your Friend List From Everyone: If you have family members on your friend list, it might be a good idea to hide your list from them. If you have your privacy settings wide open, everyone can see your list, allowing them to troll through it for ways to contact you. Whatever the reason, I think it’s a great idea to hide your list of friends from everyone. Here’s how you do that:
1. See the photo up above this? Click on the ‘Update info’ section. This will bring you to a page that allows you to edit virtually any part of your personal information. It also provides a link to your other personal settings. Click on the arrow beside the word ‘About’ and you’ll see this:
This has links to all of your personal settings, including your friend list.
When you click on ‘Friends’, you’ll see a complete list of your friends, of course. What you are looking for now is the Edit button up on the top right. Click it and you’ll see this little menu:
See the padlock on the right? Click it.
Once you click on the padlock you will see this menu next:
I would choose 'Only me' here but it's up to you.
As you can see, I have chosen ‘Only me’ for my friend list. Any friend who has a mutual friend will be able to see a list of mutual friends but that’s it. See the tip below but for now, no one can see your whole list except you.
TIP: The new timeline will not allow you to hide mutual friends from anyone on your list. Keep that in mind.
Everyone has different levels of security that make them feel safe online. I’m pretty open about most things but I don’t see why my friends have to see who I am friends with. I can further adjust these settings by grouping my friends into smaller groups. More on that in a future post.
Thanks for reading! Comments are welcome.
a little bit of hi-tech, a little bit of common sense and a lot of fun
