Facebook freaking me out with 'People you may know'

[IGotANewMugForChristmas]

I have two facebook accounts. The one on my laptop I use to post on a group for a medical condition that I don't want most people to know about.

I use my personal account on my phone.

I never log in to my personal account on the laptop and yet all my friends have popped up as 'people I may know'.

They can't see my other account can they?!

It will probably come up on their ‘people you may know’ but if you aren’t rodeo ends and your security is tight then they can’t see what you’ve posted.

If the group is a secret group then they won’t be able to see anything anyway so no need for a separate account.

Friends! Not rodeo ends...

Hi, if you log into both accounts using the same internet connection, (I used home WiFi) for some reason, Facebook will know this and it will pop up as ‘people i may know’. I only know this because it happened to me...

Yes it’s to do with your internet connection.

I think it also tracks your location and suggests people when you've been in the same location as them a few times. I've had colleagues, with whom I have no mutual friends, pop up on my list of people you may know.

This happened to me it feels creepy, like someone is looking over your shoulder.

I have a Facebook account under a fake name with no Facebook friends, I only use it for a support group and Team RH. I have not linked my phone number. No one IRL knows about this account.

Yet people who I know IRL, whose phone number I don’t have in contacts have regularly started popping up in people you may know. Including one day after a wedding I got about a dozen people pop up as people you may know who had been guests at the wedding. I also get people from a different country who are friends of my brother popping up in there.

Very concerning.

I should add it’s the only FB account I have, I’m not on any social media otherwise.

It's disconcerting isn't it.

I had a guy pop up as People you May Know who I had been chatting with through online dating 6 months previously. We had swapped numbers, but had not connected on facebook. Still facebook knew I had connected with him. It freaked me out.

The other thing is when you get adverts on facebook for stuff that you have been discussing verbally. DP and I had been discussing a joke phrase recently, and an advert has come up on his FB with a T Shirt with that same phrase written on it.... weird.

I have two accounts for a similar reason and it wasn't until I had to log into the less used one on my phone that I started to get friend suggestions from my main account to my second one.

It never happens the other way though which is odd.

I've read before that if you are logged in with location on you get friend suggestions for people who are also in the same place with their location on.

Yes, I made a joke like “have you got a body in that bin bag?” to one of my students who brought a massive bin bag (of washing!) to her tutorial at the end of term. I looked up something for her, a support group on FB, and was inundated with adverts for XL refuse sacks! We both freaked out that our conversation had been heard. Then we started seeing adverts for bleach and drain cleaner. As if FB thought we were actually disposing of a body .

EleanorOalike 'As if FB thought we were actually disposing of a body'.

Oh dear! I know it can't have been funny for you at the time,but I did laugh at this!

Don’t worry we laughed, albeit uneasily, too!

Hi OP using different devices (phone / laptop) makes no difference. However, if the group you post in for the medical stuff is ‘closed’ then your regular account friends won’t see your posts in there. Not sure how they recommend friends though. Do you use a different name for each account?