Reddit is putting privacy back into the hands of its users with a setting that lets them curate their profile and decide what information on their profile is public and what posts or subreddits they want to hide.
“Reddit is a place where you find community and connect with others based on what you’re passionate about,” Reddit says. “And let’s face it – what we’re passionate about can often have…range.“
The new settings are located under a new “Curate your profile” section. It’s rolling out now to iOS, Android, and the web. The full release will take a “few weeks.”
(Credit: Reddit)
It’s only on a subreddit basis, so you can’t hide all individual posts. But if there are a few forums you frequent and would rather keep under wraps, the new capability could make it more comfortable to freely post and comment. You can also selectively display posts from those subreddits, so you don’t need to hide everything. Today, the default displays all posts and comments on your profile.
Reddit knows NSFW (not safe for work) content is a much-frequented underbelly of the site, so it introduced a special toggle that will hide all evidence of interactions with NSFW subreddits. Other private activities might include advice-seeking posts or confessions. If all your friends think you’re a macho sports lover, but you’re secretly a big fan of The Bachelor (r/thebachelor), you can hide that, too. A new Followers toggle also shows or hides follower counts.
One exception is that subreddit moderators can see all user posts for 28 days.
Some users say the change will invite more spam content and misinformation onto the platform. “This seems like it’s going to lead to bad actors being able to more easily hide their behavior from the average user,” one Redditor writes. “Unless you’re a mod, you won’t be able to see that they’re posting inflammatory misinformation across a dozen different subs, for instance. Less transparency isn’t good.”
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“Nobody wants this, and it just makes it harder to judge someone’s trustworthiness based on what they choose to share,” another user adds. Someone else notes: “Congratulations to all the spam accounts. I guess any traffic is good traffic to Reddit then.”
Reddit CEO Steve Huffman at the company’s 2024 IPO. (Credit: Spencer Platt / Staff / Getty Images News via Getty Images)
From Reddit’s perspective, the new settings can help turn lurkers into posters and give the company more valuable data. It has multi-million dollar AI licensing deals with OpenAI and Google, which allow those companies to train their models on human posts. It’s coveted data, so when Reddit found out Anthropic was accessing its site without its permission or a licensing deal, it filed a lawsuit, The New York Times reports.
Reddit plans to continue adding new privacy and profile-based settings. “This is just the beginning of evolving user profiles on Reddit,” it says. “We’re continuing to invest in features that help you manage your identity and presence across the platform.”
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About Emily Forlini
Senior Reporter
