Mastering LinkedIn Privacy: Here's How to Make Your LinkedIn Private

How to Make LinkedIn Private

LinkedIn is a powerful platform for building your professional network, showcasing your skills, and finding new opportunities.

However, there may be times when you want to limit who can see your profile, activity, or connections.

You may want to keep your job search discreet, protect your personal information, or avoid unwanted contact.

This article will show you how to make LinkedIn private, by adjusting your settings and preferences.

Table of Contents

Why Make LinkedIn Private?

Some of the common reasons are:

You want to control your online reputation and personal brand and decide who can access your professional information.
You want to keep your current employer, colleagues, or clients unaware of your job search activities, or avoid potential conflicts of interest.
You want to protect your privacy and security and prevent identity theft, phishing, or spam.
You want to reduce your digital footprint and minimize the amount of data that LinkedIn collects and shares about you.
You want to be selective and strategic in your networking and choose who can view, contact, or connect with you.

Access the LinkedIn website and follow these steps:

Sign in to your LinkedIn account and click the Me icon at the top-right corner of the homepage.
Select Settings & Privacy from the dropdown menu.
Click on the Visibility tab in the Settings & Privacy section.

Here, you can adjust various settings that affect how visible your profile, network, and activity are to others like:

Editing your public profile and URL, and choosing what information is visible to non-LinkedIn members and search engines.
Change your profile viewing options, and select how you appear when you view other people’s profiles.
Manage who can see your connections, followers, and last name.
Control who can see your email address, phone number, and birthday.
Turn on or off your active status, share job changes and broadcast activity.
You can choose from different options for each setting, such as Everyone, Your network, Connections only, or Only you. You can also customize some settings by adding or removing specific people or groups.

Use the LinkedIn app and follow these steps:

Open the LinkedIn app and tap your profile picture at the top-left corner of the screen.
Tap View Profile to go to your profile page.
Tap the More icon at the top-right corner of the screen, and select Settings from the menu.
Tap on the Visibility tab in the Settings section.

Here, you can adjust the same settings as the desktop version.

Keep these in mind:

Review and update your settings regularly, and align them with your current goals and needs. For example, if you are actively looking for a new job, you may want to make your profile more visible and open to recruiters, but if you are happy with your current position, you may want to make it more private and discreet.
Balance your privacy and visibility, and consider the trade-offs of each setting. For example, if you make your profile completely private, you may protect your information, but you may also miss out on potential opportunities, connections, or insights.
Be consistent and coherent in your settings, and avoid conflicting or confusing choices. For example, if you make your profile private, but you share your activity publicly, you may send mixed signals to your audience.
Be aware of the limitations and exceptions of your settings, and understand how they work in different scenarios. For example, some settings may not apply to your 1st-degree connections, or people with access to your email address or phone number.
Check your profile from different perspectives, and see how it looks to different users. For example, you can use the View As feature to see how your profile appears to the public, your network, or a specific connection.

Making LinkedIn private is a simple but effective way to manage your professional online presence and protect your personal information.

By following the steps and tips here, you can create a custom privacy level that suits your preferences and situation.

This can help you enjoy the benefits of LinkedIn while avoiding the risks and drawbacks.