Facebook launches UK ad campaign to promote privacy controls

Video shows people on beach with varying levels of modesty.

Facebook: press ad, left, and still from film
Facebook: press ad, left, and still from film

Facebook has launched a UK ad campaign to increase users' awareness of how to control privacy settings. 

The campaign is part of chief executive Mark Zuckerberg’s wider efforts to create a more privacy-focused social network in the wake of last year’s Cambridge Analytica data breach scandal.

Facebook also cited new research that revealed half of all UK social media users say they worry about their privacy and the same number of people say they know how to control who sees their photos on the platform.

Only a fifth (22%) know how to customise their privacy settings on any social media platform, Facebook’s research also found.

Created by Possible, a hero video will run over the next 10 weeks on video-on-demand, cinema and digital, in addition to press activity and another film for Facebook and Instagram Stories.

The hero video shows people on the beach with varying levels of modesty, highlighting how users will have different privacy preferences. The work was created by Jake Kirk and Clare Wilson, and directed by Keith McCarthy through Stink. Mindshare is the media agency. 

All the creative makes prominent the baseline privacy options for users to make their content visible to the public, their friends or just themselves.

Meanwhile, Facebook is today (Wednesday) opening the doors to a number of Facebook Cafés – temporary pop-up shops in major UK cities – that will be active until 5 September. The social media giant wants customers to conduct a privacy checkup with a Facebook employee while they wait for a free coffee.

"We often hear that people aren't aware that some of these features exist, or don't know where to find them," Aaron Hoffman, UK marketing manager for Facebook, explained. "So we have a responsibility to get the word out so that people know how to manage their privacy settings."

For Facebook's research, OnePoll surveyed 2,000 Facebook users between 24 July and 31 July.

Possible is being folded into Mirum, part of WPP’s Wunderman Thompson.

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