Thank you to everyone who has shared your feedback with us on our team blogs, Live QnA, and through other channels.  We’ve heard some concerns from some of you that the new Windows Live isn’t respecting the privacy settings that you’ve put in place already, and wanted to take a few minutes to address those concerns.

• The privacy and security of your information is a top priority for us, and we want to assure you that we haven’t done anything that changes any of the privacy settings you’ve put in place. We have made changes that allow information you’ve already entered to be shared more easily across Windows Live. This means information you’ve entered is showing up in many more places and can make it look more public than it was before. But, the key thing is that the privacy settings you put in place when you first entered that information are still being honored.
• It’s important to note that your view of your own profile typically shows more information than visitors will see.  For example, you will see your last name on your profile if you’ve entered it before, but unless you’ve explicitly changed the permissions on it, then other people won’t see it when they visit your profile.  This principle holds true throughout Windows Live – people will always (and only) see the content that they have permissions to view.  See below for pictures that show how this works.
  
  Here is an example of Joe User’s profile, viewed by himself (left), next to the same profile viewed by a public visitor (right). 

The visitor sees much less information (right), because Joe hasn’t given them permission to see it.

How to change who can see what

To help address any confusion, we’ve pulled together the following links to where you can view and edit your permissions, as well as step-by-step instructions you can follow to protect your information the way you want.

Profile info

• Name - Choose whether to make your last name public
• Profile picture – Choose who can see your profile picture.  Note that this is separate from your Messenger picture.
• Your network– Choose who can see who is in your network (which is made up of your old Messenger contacts and your Spaces friends).
• About you – Choose who can see your basic info like your occupation, location, and interests.
• Your personal message – Choose who can see your status message.
• Contact info – Choose who can see your contact info like your email address and mobile phone number.
• Social – Choose who can see information like your favorite quote.
• Work info – Choose who can see what company you work for.
• Favorite things – Choose who can see the books, music, and movies you’ve added to your profile.

Invitations and communication preferences

• Communication preferences – Choose who can invite you to their network, and if you want to get e-mail notifications when they invite you.
• Notes – Choose who can post notes onto your profile, and who can view them.
• Photo and file comments – Choose if you want to allow comments on your photos and files.
• Blog comments – Choose if you want to allow comments on your blog posts. (See step-by-step instructions below)
• Guestbook comments – Choose how people can comment on your guestbook. (See step-by-step instructions below)
• People tagging – Choose if you want to allow your contacts to tag you and if you want to allow tagging of people in your photos.

What’s New

• What’s new with you - Choose which of your activities (like posting photos or adding to your network) that you want others to see. You can remove individual items and/or remove all future items for each type of activity. (See step-by-step instructions below)
• Web activities - Choose who will see your activities from other web services like Flickr and Twitter.

Your content

• Your space – Choose who can view your Space (including your blog).
• Your photos – Choose who can view photos in each of your albums.
• Your files – Choose who can view files in each of your folders.

Step-by-step instructions

Updated: Links to most permissions settings can now be found all in one place, at http://profile.live.com/permissions/.

Here are the specific steps to follow if you want to change the permissions in any of these areas:

Profile info

Name

1. http://account.live.com/editname.aspx
2. Make any changes you would like.
3. Click Save.

Profile picture

1. http://account.live.com/editpic.aspx
2. Make any changes you would like.
3. Click Save.

Your network

1. http://home.live.com/options/
2. Click Network permissions (lower left)
3. Make any changes you would like.
4. Click Save.

About you

1. http://account.live.com/editabout.aspx
2. Make any changes you would like.
3. Click Save.

Your personal message

1. http://account.live.com/editprofileaccess.aspx?pa=psm
2. Make any changes you would like.
3. Click Save.

Contact info

1. http://account.live.com/editcontact.aspx
2. Make any changes you would like.
3. Click Save.

Social

1. http://account.live.com/editinterests.aspx
2. Make any changes you would like
3. Click [Save]

Work info

1. http://account.live.com/editwork.aspx
2. Make any changes you would like.
3. Click Save.

Favorite things

1. http://profile.live.com/FavoriteThings/
2. Click Edit permissions.
3. Make any changes you would like.
4. Click Save.

Note: You can also add, delete, or edit any item in your Favorite Things from step 1.

Invitations and communication

Communication preferences

1. http://spaces.live.com/commpref.aspx
2. Make any changes you would like.
3. Click Save.

Notes

1. http://profile.live.com/notes/
2. Click Edit permissions
3. Make any changes you would like.
4. Click Save.

Note: By default, only people in your network can post notes

Note: You can delete a note posted on your profile by clicking Delete next to the note.

Photo and file comments

1. http://skydrive.live.com/commentoptions.aspx
2. Make any changes you would like.
3. Click Save.

Blog comments

1. http://spaces.live.com/
2. Click View your space (top left).
3. Click the Options menu (top right) and then click Blog.
4. Make any changes you would like.
5. Click Save.

Note: If you know the web address of your space, you can skip steps 1-3 by going to http://<your_space>.spaces.live.com/options/blog/

Guestbook comments

1. http://spaces.live.com/
2. Click View your space (top left).
3. Click the Options menu (top right) and then click Guestbook.
4. Make any changes you would like.
5. Click Save.

Note: If you know the web address of your space, you can skip 1-3 by going to http://<your_space>.spaces.live.com/options/guestbook/

People tagging

1. http://skydrive.live.com/peopleoptions.aspx
2. Make any changes you would like.
3. Click Save.

What’s New

Remove an update from What’s New with you

1. http://profile.live.com/
2. Hold your mouse pointer over the update.
3. Click the round blue gear (Settings icon) that appears at right.
4. Click Remove this update.

Remove future updates from What’s New with you

1. http://profile.live.com/whatsnewwithyousettings/
2. Make any changes you would like.
3. Click Save.

Hide updates from specific people from “What’s new with your network”

1. http://profile.live.com/whatsnewsettings/
2. Type the name or e-mail address of the person whose updates you want to hide.
3. Click Hide.
4. You should see a yellow bar at the top that says “Your changes have been saved.”

Hide updates of a specific type from “What’s New with your network”

1. http://profile.live.com/whatsnewsettings/
2. Select or clear the check boxes under Updates from Windows Live and Updates from web activities
3. Click Save.
4. You should see a yellow bar at the top that says “Your changes have been saved.”

Web activities

1. http://profile.live.com/webactivities/
2. Click Manage web activities.
3. Click Edit under the web activity that you want to change the settings for.
4. Make any changes you would like.
5. Click Save.

Note: You can also add web activities from step 1 by clicking Add under the web activity you want to add.

Your content

Your space

1. On the Home page, click More, and then click Spaces, or go to: http://spaces.live.com/.
2. Click View your space (top left).
3. Click the Options menu (top right) and then click Permissions.
4. Make any changes you would like.
5. Click Save.

Note: If you know the web address of your space, you can skip 1-3 by going to http://<your_space>.spaces.live.com/options/permissions/

Your photos

1. http://skydrive.live.com/albums.aspx
2. Click the album you want to work with.
3. At the bottom, it will say “Shared with: <who the album is shared with>”. Click whoever it is shared with currently.
4. Click Edit permissions
5. Make any changes you would like.
6. Click Save.

Note: You also set album permissions when you create a new album

Your files

1. http://skydrive.live.com/home.aspx
2. Click the folder you want to work with.
3. At the bottom, it will say “Shared with: <who the folder is shared with>”. Click whoever it is shared with currently.
4. Click Edit permissions.
5. Make any changes you would like.
6. Click Save.

Note: You also set folder permissions when you create a new folder

RSS feed of your space

1. http://spaces.live.com/
2. Click View your space (top left).
3. Click the Options menu (top right) and then click General.
4. Select or clear the check box for Syndicate this space (this will only be available if your space is public)
5. Click Save.

Note: If you know the web address of your space, you can skip 1-3 by going to http://<your_space>.spaces.live.com/options/general/