Dear Miriam,

Following the recent letter from another reader about the unwanted visits from her nosy neighbour, you might be able to help me with the following problem.

During the lockdown, a neighbour sent me a friend request on Facebook. Like the other letter writer, I would not be overly fond of this lady as she is known as a bit of a gossip in the parish, and she loves to have her nose in everybody’s business. But I felt I could not refuse the request either as she lives so close to us and I was afraid it would turn into a big drama if I refused it or tried to ignore it/let on that I didn’t see it.

Anyway the long and short of it is that ever since then, anytime I post anything at all, she’s straight in with a comment. It’s not that she writes anything nasty, but it’s a bit too “familiar” and it makes me feel a bit uncomfortable.

I would not share this kind of stuff with this lady in real life, so I sort of resent the fact that she can see it all online now just because I was too embarrassed to turn down her friend request

I’m not someone who over-shares anything terribly personal or private on Facebook, but I like to put up pictures and old memories, that sort of thing, and “chat” and have a laugh with long-time friends. It’s my own space I suppose. I would not share this kind of stuff with this lady in real life, so I sort of resent the fact that she can see it all online now just because I was too embarrassed to turn down her friend request.

I don’t particularly want to start censoring myself either

I can’t really “unfriend” her now though as that would seem childish and could cause an even bigger issue for me. But I don’t particularly want to start censoring myself either in terms of what I share and what I don’t share on my own page, just because I don’t want her to see it.

Have you any advice on what I could do?

Mary, Galway

Dear Mary,

Thanks for your email. The joys of social media! I’m not a tech-expert by any means, but I know that there are options on Facebook to create “restricted”, “acquaintances” and “close friends” lists so that your pictures and posts are only available to the people you wish to engage with, without actually having to hit the “unfriend” button.

However, if this lady is used to seeing a lot of your posts, it might look a bit suspicious if it goes from all to nothing. A more subtle solution might be to use the “edit privacy” option on your individual posts. This means that you can chose to “hide” a picture or post from a particular person/people on a case by case basis.

So say for example it’s an old photograph or memory that you would rather she did not see. Just click on the “edit” function (this usually looks like three dots on the top right hand side of the post), select “edit privacy” and that will bring you to an option called “friends except”. You can then click on that lady’s name from the list of all your Facebook friends. This will then mean that she won’t be able to see it.

I don’t think I’ll be getting a job in IT any time soon, but I hope that this advice is someway clear

If it’s something you are less precious about eg if you are sharing a post from a local business or a competition, then I probably wouldn’t bother changing the privacy options as it’s not personal and probably not worth the effort to do it every time. It also means that it won’t look as suspicious if she goes for a snoop on your page and finds that she can still view some of your posts!

I don’t think I’ll be getting a job in IT any time soon, but I hope that this advice is someway clear and helpful for your sticky social media situation. Thanks for getting in touch.