Candid personal photos of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg have appeared on the web following a Facebook privacy overhaul that critics warned would lead people to share more of their private lives publicly than ever before.

The shots of Zuckerberg, some of which show the 25-year-old apparently inebriated and cuddling a teddy bear, reveal a different side of the brainy geek who has rapidly risen from bumbling college student to a captain of the web industry.

It follows claims in a controversial new book, The Accidental Billionaires, that Zuckerberg started the social networking site as a way to pick up women and that he dined on a koala on the yacht of a Sun Microsystems executive.

Facebook announced an overhaul of its privacy controls last week, forcing all users to assess who is able to see each piece of content they publish on the site.