"What counts is that you will have more direct control of who sees a post at the time you post it," Simpson wrote.

Particularly welcome is the increased control over photo tags, which Eckersley said is "long overdue." Posting private photos of other people without their permission can create problems for them at work and at home. "The new Facebook tagging [interface] is an improvement on the previous one, which really reflected the company's ideology of oversharing," Eckersley said.

Merritt sees this ability to review posts before they are tagged as being particularly useful for preventing cyberbullying among minors.

While it's good to see Facebook improving its privacy controls and policies, regulators and legislators need to become more active on the issue, according to Simpson.

People need to be protected by "meaningful privacy legislation" that gives them the right to control the use of their online information and remove their data if they want to, Simpson wrote.