It’s no secret that Facebook collects a large amount of information to better target advertisements towards you, but exactly what information is being used has for the most part remained a mystery. The treasure chest of data Facebook stores on over 1 billion users ranges from what people like, to what pages they visit, and who they interact with online. So what pieces of information actually goes into each advertisement, and how does this data look to the average person?

Recently Facebook has been on a big push to improve privacy for their users. They have released everything from the “Privacy Dinosaur” to help with basic settings, changed the default privacy settings for new users, and even enabled a hidden page to allow users to see their ad preferences profile.

To access your Ad Preferences profile on Facebook, just follow the following steps.

1. Go to Facebook.com and login to your account.
2. Hover over an advertisement on the right side of the news feed.
3. Click on the blue x at the top right corner of the advertisement.
4. Click “Why am I seeing this?”
5. Click on “Manage Your Ad Preferences”

 

Or alternatively you can skip right to your Ad Preferences, although you will miss other relevant privacy information about advertisements, by going directly to https://www.facebook.com/ads/preferences/edit/?ad_id=6015766102901.

Once on this page you can start expanding the different sections and seeing exactly what Facebook is using as targeting terms for you. If there are some items you would prefer not to be targeted ads based upon you can click the blue switch at the right side of the term and that item will be removed.

Some users may actually prefer to provide more terms as well, so that they can see better and more relevant ads on their pages. To do this simply click in the “Add Preference” textbox at the top of the page and begin to type. You should see a dropdown with suggestions as you type more letters and once you see your item just click on it and it will be added to your profile.

This page shows Facebook is making strides to become more open and transparent in regards to their data use and privacy practices. It may be beneficial to check back at this page a few times to see how your preferences are being changed from your natural use of Facebook.

To keep up to date with the latest Facebook tips and privacy settings follow us on Twitter @AVGFree or like the AVG Facebook page.