
Convenience vs Security
As the amount of applications people use increased, password management has become a huge commodity. The are plenty of applications specifically for password management, but a trend has emerged for using your social media accounts to log into apps and/or websites. This grants companies access to your data in exchange for not having to remember another password. This may be a convenient login option, but it can also pose security risks.
What can you do to mitigate these risks and keep the convenience of one login? One good step it to review your connected applications fairly regularly and remove any you no longer require. Below we will demonstrate how to review and remove your Facebook linked accounts.
Reviewing your Facebook linked accounts
Start by logging into facebook on your web browser. (For the mobile application, the steps are the same, but the interface will obviously look different.)
In the upper right hand corner of your window, click the small triangle.

This will open a drop down menu. Select settings.

Your settings page will open. Your connected application settings have their own section closer to the bottom of the list on the left, so resist the urge to go straight to security settings, (but also please review your security settings another time!) Click “Apps and Websites”

From here you can view your active, expired and removed website and app logins. Active applications can make new requests for your information. Depending on what you share, they may still be retrieving more information about you through this link.

As a security measure, Facebook will expire access to your information if you do not use this login for some time. These companies will not receive new information from the time of expiration, but still may have access to any data sent prior to expiration.

To view and edit what information and app has or had access to, just double click on the app. The information will appear in a pop-up window.
View and edit application access


There are a lot of options to toggle such as access to your friends list, email address, and who of Facebook can see that you use that application. Change your settings to keep as much information private as you want.
You can also set general application perferences to apply to active apps, and new apps you grant access to moving forward. Review these options as well so save yourself time in the future.

Removing applications
If you want to remove linked applications from your Facebook entirely, start at the Active apps page. Check the small box next to any and all applications you wish to remove.

A pop up will ask if you are sure you want to remove this application. Keep in mind that any information already sent to the company may still be in their possession. They will just not be able to make any new inquiries or obtain new information through Facebook.


Don’t stop there!
Review your other accounts that you may have used to access websites and applications. Log into your Google account and follow the steps in our article Security and your Google Linked Accounts.
Lastly, even though Facebook will set older linked accounts to expire, its a good idea to review this information preiodically. They will often add a message in your feed to review your security and access settings to make it simple to maintain your preferred level of privacy and sharing.
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