Facebook has taken a few steps to simplified way to find people and certain posts, but actually sifting through your friends' post history has been tricky.

How are you actually supposed to find the photos from that epic party last summer? It may not be as much of a challenge now that Facebook has updated its Graph Search beta to help you track down your friends' shared posts. If you search for "Anna summer party," for example, you'll see everything Anna wrote about that memorable get-together. The smarter search is available this week for iPhone and web users in English.

There's no mention of other platforms and languages so far. Currently, It is only for iPhone platform.

SOURCE: Facebook Newsroom

BARCELONA: Finnish gaming firm Rovio expects to boost growth for months to come, with expansion in Asia, to Facebook and with the launch of Angry Birds Spaces, its marketing chief told Reuters in an interview.

Angry Birds, in which players use a slingshot to attack pigs that try to steal the birds' eggs, has been downloaded more than 700 million times since its 2009 launch and turned small Finnish gaming firm Rovio into an enterprise valued at up to US$9bil.

Marketing chief Peter Vesterbacka told Reuters the company plans to roll out five new Angry Birds games this year, starting with Angry Birds Spaces in March, after introducing just one new game last year.

Angry Birds Spaces is set in outer space, with the firm using Nasa's moon landing footage in a teaser video on YouTube.

"It is our first game launch in a year and our biggest game launch ever. We have very big expectations for it," he said.

Vesterbacka said the company was set to open first Angry Birds branded retail stores in China in a few months.

"We are just about to roll out our retail presence there, we are looking to get to a hundred stores very quickly. And I think there is a lot of potential to grow the numbers even further. We see huge potential in all of Asia," he said.

Vesterbacka said the firm was very happy with progress so far on Facebook, where it opened the game earlier this month.

"We are not the biggest game on Facebook but we are the fastest growing. We are making a lot of money already on Facebook," he said. "Of course, we want to have tens of millions of people on Facebook playing our game."

Rovio executives have said the firm would seek an initial public offering (IPO) in New York or Hong Kong, but the company was not in a rush to go public.

"We are profitable, we can fund our own growth," he said. - Reuters

NEW YORK: There are many apps that both male and female Android smartphone owners use frequently, but recent statistics from market analyst Nielsen show that women are using Facebook and men are using mapping and mail apps like Google Maps and Gmail much more than the opposite sex.

Facebook, Google Maps and Gmail were among the most used applications by Android users over the age of 18 in the United States but when it came to male vs female application use, Nielsen's figures show a gender divide.


Over the last month Facebook's overall active reach (the percentage of Android owners who used an app within the last 30 days) was much higher among women (81%) than men (66.9%).

Women were also slightly more likely to use Twitter than men. While women were busy social networking, men were looking up directions and checking their mail. Men were more likely to use Google Maps (77.1% vs 71.9%) and Gmail (75.5% vs 73.4%) than their female counterparts.

Interestingly, Google's social networking app Google+ had more than double the reach among men (15.8%) than women (7.2%). "Outside of social media, apps like Amazon's Kindle and Words With

Friends showed higher active reach among women," said Nielsen, "while apps like Quickoffice Pro and the Amazon Appstore had higher active reach among male Android smartphone owners."

Google-made apps ranked highly within Nielsen's top Android applications. Google's own Android Market app had the highest overall active reach among all users, female and male.

An April report by app store analyst Distimo found that Apple-made applications such as iBooks, Pages and Numbers ranked highly in the all-time most popular free and paid applications in the Apple App Store for iPhone.

Top 20 most used Android applications in the US according to Nielsen (overall active reach):

Android Market (90.5%)
Google Maps (74.6%)
Gmail (74.5%)
Facebook (73.5%)
Google Search (71.9%)
YouTube (51.4%)
Angry Birds (25.9%)
QuickofficePro (25.3%)
Pandora Radio (23.9%)
The Weather Channel (17.8%)
Amazon AppStore (17.7%)
Words With Friends (16.0%)
Talk - Text to Voice (16.0%)
Twitter (14.9%)
Barcode Scanner (13.9%)
Adobe Reader (13.9%)
Angry Birds Rio (13.6%)
Kindle (12.4%)
Google+ (11.8%)

TOKYO: As Japan grapples with an unprecedented triple disaster - earthquake, tsunami, nuclear crisis - the Web has spawned creativity and innovation online amid a collective desire to ease suffering.

Once the magnitude of the March 11 disaster became clear, the online world began asking, "How can we help?"

And for that, social media offered the ideal platform for good ideas to spread quickly, supplementing efforts launched by giants like Google and Facebook.

A British teacher living in Abiko city, just east of Tokyo, is leading a volunteer team of bloggers, writers and editors producing Quakebook, a collection of reflections, essays and images of the earthquake that will be sold in the coming days as a digital publication.

Proceeds from the project will go to the Japanese Red Cross, said the 40-year-old, who goes by the pseudonym "Our Man in Abiko."

The entirely Twitter-sourced project started with a single tweet exactly a week after the earthquake. Within an hour, he had received two submissions, which soon grew to the 87 that now comprise the book.

Quakebook involves some 200 people in Japan and abroad, and the group is in negotiations to sell the download on Amazon.com.

It didn't take long for others to notice. Twitter itself has sent out a tweet about Quakebook, as has Yoko Ono. Best-selling novelist Barry Eisler wrote the foreword for the book.

"I just thought I want to do something," he said in a telephone interview. "I felt completely helpless."

Another project, "World's 1,000 Messages for Japan," is an effort to convey thoughts from around the globe. Writers can leave short notes on Facebook or through e-mail, which a group of volunteers then translate into Japanese. The translations are then posted on Twitter as well as the group's website.

"The news of the earthquake, tsunami, and meltdown in Japan has mostly been horrifying. But it has also served as a reminder of the strength and resolve that comes out of Japanese culture," said one recent message on the project's Facebook page.

The calamitous events that transfixed people worldwide led to a jump in traffic among social networking sites - typical after recent major disasters elsewhere.

In the immediate aftermath of the disaster that likely killed more than 18,000 people, phone and cellular networks were either down or overwhelmed with traffic.

So people turned to the Internet to track down friends and family, and connect with those who saw the disaster unfold firsthand. In Tokyo, which suffered minimal damage, commuters wanted to know if their trains were running, and whether their neighborhoods would be subject to rolling electricity blackouts due to damage to nuclear and conventional power plants.

Figures released this week show that millions flocked to sites like Twitter following the earthquake and tsunami. Its audience grew by a third to 7.5 million users during March 7-13 compared with the previous week, according to the Nielsen NetRatings Japan.

Video streaming provider Ustream and Japanese video-sharing platform Nico Nico Douga also saw viewership climb. Ustream's audience more than doubled to 1.4 million, driven largely by public broadcaster NHK's channel featuring live coverage online, the report said.

Concerns

The numbers underscore the increasingly valuable role that social media, particularly Twitter, can play in the wake of natural disasters. The microblogging site helped drive fundraising after the earthquake in Haiti last year, and it served as a critical communication tool after the New Zealand earthquake in February.

Twitter was already a big hit in Japan, where more than three-quarters of the population is connected to the Internet. The earthquake convinced even more users of its value as a communication lifeline.

"Many people signed up for Twitter after the earthquake, and that's because they wanted to exchange information," said Nobuyuki Hayashi, a prominent Japanese tech journalist and consultant.

"Twitter played a great role in the first few days" after the quake, he said. He added, however, that the surge of activity also brought to light some of Twitter's shortcomings during disasters.

As helpful as Twitter was after the quake, it also helped propagate a number of unfounded rumours and fears. A post-quake fire at an oil refinery east of Tokyo led to a torrent of tweets that incorrectly claimed the blaze would result in toxic rain.

Some people moved to Facebook "because they can access more trusted information and engage in more topic-based conversation," Hayashi said.

That's something that concerns web designer Qanta Shimizu as well. But he sees a greater good in embracing social media in times of crisis.

In 1995, when a massive earthquake devastated the western city of Kobe, the Internet was in its infancy and the mass media controlled the flow of information. National consciousness of the disaster shifted too quickly, Shimizu said, as the media moved on to new topics.

"Society has changed now, and through the Internet, I wanted to find a way to offer support indefinitely," he said.

Shimizu created a Twitter application to remind Internet users to do their part, however small. Setsudener - a play on the Japanese term for "save energy" - automatically darkens a user's profile picture from 5pm to 8pm, symbolising the need to cut back on power consumption during peak demand.

Japanese web developer Yusuke Wada created Anpi Report to gather and organise information posted on Twitter about missing individuals. Through Facebook and Twitter, he has found more than 200 volunteers to manually sift through tweets to enter into a database.

Anpi Report hopes to expand in the near future by linking its information with Google's "person finder" database for people who are either seeking information about a missing person or have information to provide about someone affected by the disaster.

For others, especially local governments and agencies, simply venturing onto social media has been a big step.

Mitaka city in western Tokyo decided to start a Twitter account after the earthquake. Announcements of the possible rolling blackouts led to a huge spike in traffic on the city's website that it could not handle, said spokesman Shinichi Akiyama.

One of the city's recent posts informed residents that The Tokyo Electric Power Co had called off blackouts for Wednesday - an essential piece of information for businesses and households. The information is posted on the city's website, but putting it out on Twitter enables the city to keep residents informed in real-time, Akiyama said.

"We're using social media a bit differently than what it was probably intended for, like having a conversation," he said. "But it has helped us realise that it's possible to use social media as a tool."

Mitaka's neighbours took note almost immediately. Nearby cities like Musashino and Koganei have also signed up for Twitter, as have numerous municipalities in the hardest-hit areas of northeast Japan. - AP

NEW YORK: Facebook will require all games on its site to accept payments through its own virtual currency system beginning July 1.

Although game developers won't have to use Facebook Credits as their only in-game currency, those who do will get special incentives, such as early access to new product features and more desirable targeting for ads, the company said.

Facebook gets a 30% cut when developers use Credits to sell virtual goods and other items. Although Facebook relies mostly on advertisements to make money, the payments system lets Facebook broaden its revenue sources.

Deborah Liu, a platform marketing manager at Facebook, said in a blog post that more than 350 applications from 150 game developers already use Credits. That accounts for more than 70% of all virtual goods transactions on the site.


Facebook users can use virtual currency to buy items such as special crops in FarmVille and virtual deep fryers in Cafe World, both from Zynga. Credits can be purchased through Facebook using PayPal, credit cards or a mobile phone account.

Facebook, which is based in Palo Alto, California, said it plans to work with developers who don't use Credits yet to get feedback and make improvements to the system. - AP

TIME TO CHANGE: A touted solution to the running out of "IP" numbers is to switch to a standard called IPv6 that allows trillions of Internet addresses, while the current IPv4 standard provides a meagre four billion or so.

With everything from smartphones to Internet-linked appliances and cars getting online, the group entrusted with organising the Web is running out of the "IP" numbers that identify destinations for digital traffic.

The touted solution to the problem is a switch to a standard called IPv6 that allows trillions of Internet addresses, while the current IPv4 standard provides a meagre four billion or so.

"The big pool in the sky that gives addresses is going to run out in the next several weeks," said Google engineer Lorenzo Colitti, who is leading the Internet giant's transition to the new standard.

"In some sense, we are driving toward a wall. We have to do something, and IPv6 is the only real long-term solution."

The pool in the sky is a fast-draining reservoir of IP addresses maintained by the non-profit Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).

ICANN has been calling for a change to IPv6 for years but websites and Internet service providers have been clinging to the old standard since the birth of the Internet.

"One of the reasons it has taken so long to change is that there is no obvious advantage or killer application for IPv6," Colitti said.

The number of addresses that IPv6 allows for amounts to 340 "undecillion" (followed by 36 zeroes); enough for a trillion people to each be assigned trillions of IP numbers, according to ICANN chief Rod Beckstrom.

"I guess if we could somehow link an IP address to every atom, we might begin to run into problems," Beckstrom said of IPv6 during an interview in his office in the Silicon Valley city of Palo Alto.

"As far as thinking about the number of objects that humans own and use, we are pretty safe."

With about seven billion people on the planet, the IPv4 protocol doesn't allow for everyone to have a gadget with its own online address.

The situation has been equated to not having enough telephone numbers for everyone.

Once the supply of IPv4 addresses ICANN distributes to the five regional centers around the world are gone, computers and other gadgets might have to start sharing instead of having unique identifying numbers.

"You will start to share with your neighbors, and that causes problems because applications can't distinguish you apart," Colitti said. "If your neighbour ends up in a blacklist, you will too."

"The Internet won't stop working; it will just slowly degrade," he continued, explaining that systems would eventually have trouble handling multiple connections on shared addresses. "Things will get slower and flakier."

Don't worry

New websites or online services stuck with shared IP addresses wouldn't perform as well as pre-existing offerings that have numbers all to themselves.

The effort and expense of changing to IPv6 would fall mostly on Internet service providers, websites and network operators that have to make sure systems can handle the new online addresses and properly route traffic.

Consumers, for the most part, shouldn't notice the switch since complex IP numbers would still appear to them as words and domains, such as ICANN.org.

Some people might need to update routers or modems that connect computers to the Internet.

"It is important that users don't worry," Colitti said, dismissing talk of an 'IP-ocalypse.'

"But, it is important that we as an industry work together," he noted. "It is critical we preserve this extremely precious Internet and allow it to grow."

Google, Facebook and other major Internet players will add IPv6 addresses to their systems in a one-day trial run on June 8 to let all parties involved check for trouble spots.

"We need to kick the tires on it at a global scale and see if there are some unforeseen problems," Colitti said. "There is really a rallying cry element to it. No single player can do it alone; we need to work together."

World IPv6 Day will start at 0001 GMT on June 8.

In a worst case scenario, running out of IPv4 addresses with no switch to IPv6 would mean new gadgets wouldn't be able to connect to the Internet because addresses weren't available, according to ICANN.

"Ideally, people will see nothing," Beckstrom said of a transition to IPv6.

But, "if enough networks don't move to IPv6," he continued, "people could literally see nothing because they can't connect the next iPad, iPhone, or whatever."

IPv6 allows for seemingly limitless innovation in the Internet as well as addresses enough for sensors in anything from chairs and thermostats to individual bottles of wine in a cellar to signal when vintages peak.

A full shift to IPv6 will take years, with the remaining stock of old IP addresses being allocated to support the transition, according to Beckstrom.

Google, Facebook and other major Internet players will add IPv6 addresses to their systems in a one-day trial run on June 8.

NO HOLIDAY CHEER: Yahoo! is preparing to lay off between 600 and 700 workers in the latest shake-up triggered by the Internet company's lackluster growth. - AP

SAN FRANCISCO: Yahoo! Inc's holiday trimmings will include 600 to 700 layoffs in the Internet company's latest shake-up triggered by lackluster growth.

Employees could be notified of the job cuts as early as today, according to a person familiar with Yahoo!'s plans. The person asked for anonymity because Yahoo! hadn't made a formal announcement.

The planned cutbacks represent about 5% of Yahoo!'s workforce of 14,100 employees. It will mark Yahoo!'s fourth mass layoff in the past three years.

The latest two housecleanings have come under the company's current CEO, Carol Bartz, a Silicon Valley veteran hired nearly two years, despite a lack of experience on the Web or in advertising - Yahoo!'s main source of revenue.

This week's round of reductions is expected to be concentrated in Yahoo!'s US products group, which already has been undergoing an overhaul since Bartz hired former Microsoft Corp executive Blake Irving to run the division last spring.

The job cuts won't come as a shock. News of the looming layoffs was first reported last month by two popular technology blogs, TechCrunch and All Things Digital.

Yahoo!'s feeble financial growth, stagnant stock price and recent management defections have raised questions about whether Bartz herself might be shown the door before her contract expires in January 2013.

The company's revenue had edged up by less than 2% to US$4.8bil (RM15.4bil) through the first nine months of the year, reflecting the difficulty Yahoo! has had selling ads while other Internet companies such as Google Inc and Facebook are thriving.

Google's revenue climbed 23% to nearly US$21bil (RM67.2bil) through the first nine months of the year. Privately held Facebook doesn't disclose its results but it is growing so fast that it had to move into larger headquarters earlier this year.

The malaise has spurred speculation that opportunistic buyout firms might put together a takeover bid for Yahoo!, possibly in partnership with another embattled Internet icon, AOL Inc.

Bartz, 62, has repeatedly insisted Yahoo!, which is based in Sunnyvale, is heading in the right direction, although she has cautioned it might be another year or two before there's a significant improvement in the company's financial results. - AP

CONTROVERSIAL: Facebook has been banned in Saudi Arabia. - AP

RIYADH: An official with Saudi Arabia's communications authority says it has blocked Facebook because the popular social networking website doesn't conform with the kingdom's conservative values.

The official says Saudi's Communications and Information Technology Commission has blocked the site and an error message shows up when Internet users try to access it.

He says Facebook's content had "crossed a line" with the kingdom's conservative morals, but that blocking the site is a temporary measure.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorised to speak to the media.

Pakistan and Bangladesh both imposed temporary bans on Facebook this year. - AP

Windows Live Hotmail 2011

Microsoft has updated two of its most popular online services, Windows Live Hotmail and Messenger 2011.

The biggest improvement in the update is that users will be able integrate multiple social networks and other e-mail via the two services.

Yes, this essentially means you can now check updates from Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn all from one window within the newly updated Windows Live Messenger 2011.

The updated instant messaging client will also allow users to chat with their Facebook friends from Messenger.

Users will be able to use tabbed conversation windows to manage all their chats within one location instead of having multiple windows pop up.

Also, adding favourites in Messenger now filters your contacts to those that matter. In addition users can enjoy Messenger's new improved HD video chat feature.

Windows Live Hotmail 2011 has also been upgraded and redesigned to help users manage their inboxes.

The new Sweep feature is designed to help clean up junk mail from your inbox. With a few clicks through simple menus and actions, Hotmail will discard all messages from a particular sender.

Users can also filter their e-mail with a single click, showing only those that are unread and group e-mails from social networks.

Additionally Hotmail allows users to add accounts from other web e-mail services like Yahoo! and Gmail.

A trojan horse has been discovered that affects Mac OS X users, dubbed “trojan.osx.boonana.a” or ‘Koobface.’ An infected machine will hijack users social network accounts and attempt to spread the trojan further by sending out spam messages from your username.

Thus far the trojan has been spread through Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and eMail. Here is the method of operation:

The trojan behaves like a worm, by trying to bait users on various social networks to click a link. The link asks “Is this you in this video?” and, if clicked, will send a user to another website which attempts to load a Java applet, giving the user a standard Mac OS X Java Security Alert and certificate request.

If the Java applet is allowed to load, it will download files to your local machine and then start a background process which attempts to propagate the trojan. You can simply click on “Deny” to prevent any further trouble, which prevents the malicious code from loading.

Intego explains the trojan as follows:

This threat is a Mac OS X version of the Koobface worm, which is served as part of a multi-platform attack via a malicious Java applet. The malware itself is made up of a number of elements, though in order to simplify, we will use the term “Trojan horse” to describe it. (Technically, it propagates as a worm, is installed via a Trojan Horse, and installs a rootkit, backdoor, command and control, and other elements.)

The trojan also effects Windows users. The easiest way for Mac and Windows users to protect themselves from the trojan is to avoid clicking dubious links from untrusted sources and to deny sketchy Java applets. Another option is to disable Java in your web browser.

If you are concerned that you have been affected by the Koobface trojan, you can get a free removal tool through SecureMac, who rates the risk as “Critical.” Currently the download link sends you to MacScan, but this is expected to change when the removal tool is released.

WORKING TOGETHER: Microsoft online services division president Qi Lu (left) and Zuckerberg talking about the two company's search collaborations at the Galileo Auditorium on Microsoft's campus in Mountain View. - AP

SEATTLE: Microsoft Corp is starting to incorporate what your friends do on Facebook right into its Bing search engine. The software maker has a new feature that can show what someone's Facebook friends "like" on the search results page.

On Facebook and sites around the Web, people can click a "like" button to show support or share information with Facebook friends.

In the coming weeks, if you use Bing to search for a topic in the news, articles that friends have shared on Facebook might appear, along with their names and Facebook profile photos. Restaurants and movies that friends have "liked" could help you decide what to do on your next date.

Microsoft also added Facebook profile results to people searches. In the past, a search for an old friend from elementary school who shares a name with a celebrity would leave web surfers swimming in search results for the celebrity. Now, if that friend is part of your extended Facebook network, a link to his or her Facebook profile might pop up at the top of search results.

The new features were unveiled at a media event at Microsoft's Silicon Valley offices in Mountain View, California.

As these features trickle out to Bing users, those who are also logged in to Facebook will see a small notification asking if they want to see Facebook friends' information incorporated into search results.

Bing is using Facebook's existing "instant personalisation" feature, which customises websites based on the likes and interests of Facebook members and their friends.

Tailoring search results based on what friends do online is not a new idea. Google Inc, the most-visited search engine, has added ways for people to recommend certain search results or re-order the list of links on a search results page. But neither feature has really caught on.

The tie to Facebook could help No 3 search provider Microsoft nab more web searches. Not only is it competing with Google, Microsoft is racing against Yahoo! Inc.

Microsoft is currently providing search technology to Yahoo!, the No 2 search engine, but the companies are still making separate decisions about how to display results. Microsoft gets some search-ad revenue from queries made on Yahoo!, but searches on its own site are more lucrative.

Privacy concerns have plagued Facebook over the years as the company has encouraged members to reveal more details about themselves. The site has a history of introducing features that people must then remove, or opt out of, instead of waiting for members to actively sign up for the new features. That approach has riled privacy advocates.

Facebook has responded with more granular controls so users can decide exactly who can see their photos, status updates and other details.

Privacy questions dominated a question-and-answer session after the announcements. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg emphasised that Bing only taps into information that Facebook users have already designated as public.

To turn off instant personalisation entirely, go to "privacy settings" on Facebook, click on "applications and websites" and select "edit settings" next to "instant personalisation."

Microsoft has been working with Facebook since 2006. In 2007, the Redmond, Washington-based software maker invested US$240mil (RM768mil) in Facebook in exchange for a 1.6% stake.

The companies said more integrated features will be coming to Bing in the future. - AP

Managing Facebook and Twitter updates becomes even easier with the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10.

When you look at the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10, the first thing that will grab your attention is its large 4in screen.

The screen dominates the front of the smartphone and is capable of displaying beautiful and vivid pictures.

The X10 runs on Android 1.6 which is a tad older than other smartphones in the market which use Android 2.1.

I'm really new when it comes to the Android operating system or even smartphones so it took awhile to adapt to the user interface. I found it cool that I could switch screens by just swiping my finger horizontally or vertically on the screen.

However, I was not thrilled that applications took a littler longer to launch. As I am a little impatient, the screen will be covered with fingerprints due to repeated tappings by the time the app actually launched.

In Venezuela criminals use Facebook to research targets. Cops use it too — but not always for scrupulous purposes.

CARACAS, Venezuela — It has taken Venezuela by storm, but it seems that Facebook and other social networking sites also come with their perils.

Police here revealed that a pair of students at a private university in Caracas had been robbing their virtual friends’ homes using information they had compiled using Facebook.

Police raided the apartment of one of two students who, working in tandem with another couple, had been using Facebook to befriend classmates. They then used the information their new “friends” posted on their profiles to find out where they lived, what they owned and when they were not at home.

"They observe the families’ movements, they study the residencies — the comings and goings, the security measures," said Wilmer Flores Trosel, director of the CICPC, Venezuela’s eqivalent of the FBI.

Security analysts in Venezuela say it is becoming increasingly frequent for criminals to use social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Sonico and Hi5 as a source of information for house robberies, fraud and kidnappings.

And it's not just the criminals capitalizing on this online data source, the police too are using it, to go after both hard-core criminals and political protesters. In a country with little tolerance for dissent, many fear the government has designs on controlling these sites. And the crimes aided by Facebook, might give them cause to do just that. [more]

Source : globalpost.com

Facebook last Wednesday announced new privacy settings that give users some additional control over what information they share, while taking away the ability to hide a few pieces of information from the general public.

One particular piece of publicly available information--users' friends lists--caused a bit of an uproar from a number of sectors, including business people who don't necessarily want to expose their professional networks to the public and their competitors. It is also a concern to some parents who might not want their kids--or a list of their kids' friends--to be widely available.

Facebook quickly backtracked. A day later, the company announced on its blog that users can now uncheck the "Show my friends on my profile" option in the Friends box on their profile so that your friend list won't appear on your publicly viewable profile.

Unfortunately, they weren't very clear on exactly how you make the change. You won't find this checkbox in your Facebook privacy settings. Instead you have to follow these steps:

1. Click on Profile on the blue bar a the top of the screen:

2. Scroll down to the beginning of your Friends list and click on the pencil to the right of the word Friends:

3. Uncheck the box that says "Show Friend list to everyone":

You can't hide your friends from your friends and applications
Unchecking that box will hide your friends list when a non-Facebook friend views your public profile, but it will not hide your Facebook friends list from your friends when they look at your profile. Also, this information will be available to applications and application developers.

In addition, this procedure does not hide other publicly available information including your name, profile picture, gender, current city, networks you belong to, and pages you're a fan of.

Double-check your privacy settings
Most Facebook users have by now gone through the mandatory privacy settings wizard, but you can revisit your settings at any time by hovering over settings in the tool bar on the top of the screen and selecting privacy settings. If you don't do this, a fair amount of your information might be available to the public including the names of your kids and other family members (with links to their Facebook accounts), your relationship status, and where you work.

To find out how your Facebook profile looks to the public, click on Profile Information in privacy settings and then on Preview My Profile...on the upper right section of that page.