As far as social media platforms go, Snapchat is one of the most fun and versatile. However, its image-focused nature means that it is potentially one of the more sensitive. Think of the kinds of things users post: Selfies, pictures of friends and activities, even their active location.
You can, and should, have fun on Snapchat. But you should also make sure that you are doing so safely.
How to Access and Adjust General Settings for Privacy
There are a couple of general rules that you should consider on any social media account, including Snapchat.
These are things like not including your full or real name in your screen name and handle, and being cautious of what you post. For added security, you can sign up using an email that you don't give out so that other users can't find you by importing their contacts.
However, for more specific controls, you can access a special selection of privacy tools within Snapchat's settings menu. To find these tools, select your bitmoji from the upper-left corner of the screen to access your profile. From here, select the red gear in the upper-right corner to access your settings.
Before scrolling down to the privacy settings, there are general settings that you might want to look at.
Make sure that you have a strong password, two-factor authentication turned on, and that you limit the other apps that the Snapchat app shares data with. These are security measures rather than privacy measures, but there's nothing wrong with being careful.
Now, scroll down to the Additional Services section. Here, you can use the Contact Me, View My Story, See Me in Quick Add, and See My Location settings to further hide your account and account information.
Finally, scroll down further to get to the settings under the Privacy heading. We'll take a closer look at these settings than the more general settings that we've glossed over so far.
Snapchat's Privacy Settings
The Clear Conversation menu allows you to delete conversations with other Snap Users. This only affects text conversations, as Snap images famously delete themselves. Each user appears as their own line, so you can delete some conversations and save others.
The Clear Search History option works just like clearing the search history on a browser. Selecting this line from the Privacy menu doesn't open a new menu to let you only clear specific items like the Clear Conversation option does; you either clear your history or you don't.
The Clear Top Locations option works the same way but instead of clearing your search history, it resets the list of places that you visit the most.
Incidentally, Snapchat tracks this even if you have your location turned off to other users.
The Contact Syncing option lets you add or remove contacts that Snapchat uses to make it easier for you and other users to find one another.
The Spotlight & Snap Map Snaps may appear blank for you. These are Snaps that you have favorited, a feature that you can use as a bookmarks tool or to share your favorite Snaps with others. Either way, from here you can clear them or toggle their visibility to other users on and off.
Permissions is probably the most powerful tool in the Settings menu and controls what hardware on your phone Snap can access. Some of these, like the Camera, are necessary if you're going to use Snapchat at all. Others, like your Location, Microphone, Phone, Call Log, and Storage can (and probably should) be disabled.
Finally, the My Data line doesn't exactly open a settings menu. What it does do is provide you with more information about what data Snap collects and how it uses that data. You can also request your own data through this setting.
Use Snapchat Responsibly
Snapchat gives you loads of tools that you can use to connect with other people. That means that there are loads of reasons to be careful with what data is available and to whom. Fortunately, Snapchat also gives you control over how much data it collects and how that data is shared.
You don't need to be afraid of Snapchat, but you should be aware of how to use it safely.
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