As Facebook users, most of us create a contacts list that covers years and even decades of our lives-recent acquaintances next to people we have known since high school, neighbors we saw yesterday right next to the family we haven't seen for years.

With billions of people on Facebook, you must be only able to reach those people who you'd like to hear from. Facebook has plenty of tools and options to help you here, and we detail the most important below. It is easiest to access these settings on your desktop web browser, which has all the relevant Facebook settings accessible.

For people to contact you, they need to be able to locate you on Facebook. If you click on How people can find you on Facebook, you will be guided through the relevant settings. You can limit the number of friends that can request to be connected to you with friend requests, or you can allow anyone on Facebook to request to be connected to you.

In other words, you will be able to receive friend requests only from those who know you're linked. The email address and the phone number can also be set so people can find you. You can keep these details private if you want.

In this particular section of Facebook settings, you can choose to make your profile visible to search engines or not. You can turn off the toggle switch next to Do you want search engines outside Facebook to link to your profile? before clicking Next to review your settings if you don't want your profile to appear when someone types your name into Google if you don't want it to.

Other people are unable to comment on what you share on Facebook if they cannot see it. The audience selector menu just above the area where you compose the message you want to post appears every time you post something on the social network.

To choose the default setting for the audience selector on Facebook, click Who can see what you share. You can configure this here if you want your posts to be seen only by a specific group, or by everyone on Facebook except for a few contacts.

The Limit past posts section also includes a Limit button that allows you to lock down older posts shared with friends of friends or public audiences so that only your current Facebook friends can view them.

Any Facebook friend you have can send you a direct message through Facebook Messenger. (See below for more information.) if you don't want this to happen, be sure to block them or unfriend them. Facebook users can message you too, but they do not go straight to your inbox: Instead, they go into a message request folder.

You can see these messages by clicking on your profile picture (top left) or tapping Message requests in the mobile app. Reply to these messages to continue the conversation, or ignore or delete them. In the mobile Messenger app, tap your profile picture, then Privacy, Message delivery to decide whether Facebook friends and friends of friends may send you message requests.

People you are connected to on Facebook are much more likely to be able to reach you than people you are not connected to. To unfriend someone, go to their profile page on Facebook, click Friends, and then Unfriend.

Block people on Facebook you don't want to hear from. Individuals who are blocked will not be able to see what you post, tag you, message you, or add you to events. However, they may notice that they can no longer be friends with you or contact you if you block them.

The Facebook settings page has the button Blocking, then Edit next to Block users. Click Add to Blocked List, then enter the name of the person you no longer wish to hear from, then select Block. Unblocking someone will require you to manually add them back as friends if you change your mind.