Block Facebook’s Beacon Feature

Users of the social networking site Facebook might have noticed the recent uproar over Beacon, an opt-in feature that notifies friends about purchases made at outside web sites. While users can, as of yesterday, turn off the friend notifications in Facebook’s privacy settings, Facebook can still collect the information. If you want to block Facebook entirely from knowing about your outside activities, howto web site WikiHow has the solution: use the BlockSite Firefox extension and add the following URL to its block list:

http://*facebook.com/beacon/

It might not be necessary protection for everyone, but there’s nothing wrong with a little proactive privacy.