McAfee Social Protection will block people who don't have the plug-in from seeing your photos.

Intel and McAfee have collaborated on a new browser plug-in and Facebook app called Social Protection that throws a thicker wall of privacy around your photos, while still allowing you to share them with friends.

Brian Foster, senior vice president of consumer product management for McAfee, said the combo is intended to protect the digital content you own so that only your friends can see it. "The focus is on everyday use of Facebook, and how your digital content has ended up in the wrong places unintentionally," he said this morning in a phone conversation with CNET.

It sounds great for the privacy-minded, but it won't be available until the end of August, and then only in public beta. It will work with Internet Explorer 8 and above, and Firefox 8 and above.

Foster explained it as DRM for the photos you upload to Facebook. It requires a browser restart after installation, and then it pixelates photos you post to Facebook, and requires your friends to install it to restore them to normal. In final form, it will exist for free for people who just want to view photos. Foster said that McAfee hasn't decided whether it will charge for Social Protection or if it will become part of another, already-existing product.

McAfee is opening the product to the public as a... [Read more]