Facebook promises 'simplistic' privacy options

Tim Sparapani, Public Policy Director for Facebook, has said that the social networking site will launch new privacy options in the coming weeks.

Following recent cries over privacy, Facebook has said that it will simplify all privacy options for users. In a radio interview Sparapani, said, “Now we’ve heard from our users that we have gotten a little bit complex, I think we are going to work on that. We are going to be providing options for users who want simplistic bands of privacy that they can choose from and I think we will see that in the next couple of weeks.”

Sparapani also said that there’s a deep-seeded psychological need that people have to explain themselves and put themselves forward for the world wide web to see and that Facebook has created the tools that allow that to happen.

“The flip side of this privacy story that some people are telling right now is that we have customised and individualised every single website for people, if they chose to have it. It’s an extraordinary gift to the public,” he continued.

According to Sparapani the long term plan for Facebook is to continue to build a great communications tool for more interesting ways to connect and share, not only with friends but with the world.

“Part of what we’ve done over the last month is give people the opportunity to broaden their digital identity, in the same way that we might wear our sporting apparel that signifies that we’re a fan of a particular sports team. We’re allowing people to do the same thing digitally online,” he said.

Yesterday MySpace Co-President Mike Jones said that he would offer new privacy settings to all users of the site soon.