How To Delete, Disable, Or Limit Your Facebook Account

If the news of Facebook’s data handling has got you spooked, here’s how you can limit third-party access to your account.

- Nick Mediati, Melissa Riofrio, And Michael Simon

There was a time when deleting your Facebook account was a pie-in-the-sky fantasy, but this week’s news might have you thinking twice. In a series of reports, we learned that an employee at Facebook erroneously handed a trove of data to a company called Cambridge Analytica ,which in turn used that information to target voters and spread influence ahead of the 2016 U.S. election. So we totally understand if you’re having second thoughts about your account.

The good news is, you have options. First you can limit what third-party apps and the Facebook community can see about your account. If that’s not enough, you can deactivate your account, which can be undone, or full-on delete it—and even then, you have a chance to change your mind. Here’s how it works.

LIMIT YOUR FACEBOOK ACCOUNT

There are plenty of reasons why you wouldn’t want to nuke your Facebook account, but you can still lock it down. The easiest way is to take it private. Head over to Settings, then select the Privacy tab. At the top is a Your Activity window with a drop-down menu. If the Who Can See Your Posts option is set  to Public, that means anyone can see what’s on your page, whether they have a Facebook account or not. Tap the Edit button and you’ll be able to limit viewability to just friends, only specific friends, or just yourself.