Mastering Facebook’s Privacy: Constructing a Restricted List for Controlled Visibility

It’s awkward to have someone as a friend on Facebook when you don’t feel comfortable sharing with them. Maybe you want to stay friends with someone to avoid hurting their feelings, or you have your boss on your friend list and don’t want him to see your weekend activities.

If this is a familiar problem, you’ll be glad to know that Facebook has a solution. Let’s look at how to add Facebook friends to a Restricted list to control how they interact with you.

What Is a Restricted List on Facebook?

The Restricted list is a place for you to add your Facebook friends that you don’t want to share updates with. You’ll still be friends with anyone you add to the list, but they won’t see your status updates or any other content you mark as being for friends only. Only posts you set asPublic , which non-friends can already see, are visible to those on this list. They’ll also be able to see anyFacebook posts you tag them in.

This allows you to stay friends with someone, so you can still see what they post, without them seeing yours. Give it a try for anyone who you can’t bring yourself to unfriend yet.

Keep in mind that adding someone to your Restricted list is not the same asblocking them on Facebook . Blocking someone prevents them from interacting with you at all; the Restricted list only hides your posts from them.

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How to See Your Restricted List on Facebook

To see who’s on your Restricted list, open Facebook and select theFriends icon on the left sidebar. If this doesn’t appear, click theSee More dropdown arrow to show it.

On theFriends menu, chooseCustom Lists , thenRestricted . This will show you anyone who’s currently on the list. To remove someone, click theX by their name. To add people, chooseAdd/Remove at the top-right, where you can search for friends and check any you want to restrict.

You can also add a friend to the Restricted list on their Facebook page. Visit a profile on Facebook, click theFriends button, and clickEdit Friend List . Here, check theRestricted box to accomplish the same goal.

People won’t get an alert when you add them to your Restricted list. But if they’re knowledgeable about how Facebook works (and depending on how much you post), they might notice that they don’t see as much content from you anymore. Because of this, you may wish to add someone to your Restricted list right after friending them.

Keep Your Friends at a Safe Distance

Now you know how to use the Restricted list on Facebook to remain friends with someone but prevent them from seeing what you post. Hopefully, you aren’t friends with many people who you don’t want to interact with, but this makes it a little easier to manage those complicated relationships.

Meanwhile, if it’s been a while since you’ve looked over your Facebook friends list, we’d recommend cleaning it out for your security and sanity.

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