How is this possible? (fb related)

[Daisyinadesert]

I have a secret fb account that I use to message businesses for my job, I don’t have any personal friends or post anything on it. My name is my first name and initials used for my surname, so it’s not identifying in any way and a very common sounding name at that.
I had a little snoop at an old friend to see what’s she’s doing in life, at least a week ago, met a mutual friend this morning and went to her profile to show her and found she’d blocked my account. Our mutual friend searched her name on her fb and she could still see her account. I have no idea how she knew it was me or that I had even looked at her account, or why she blocked me for that matter! Neither of us have spoken to her for 20 years as she was in a bad way and cut everyone off, she crosses my mind now and again and I’m happy to see she found happiness eventually, I wasn’t going to reach out or upset the apple cart so to speak.
Any one have any idea how she knew it was me?

You would have appeared on her "people you may know" list after you looked at her profile and she thought your name looked familiar and blocked you to be on the safe side?

Or, whilst you were snooping you accidentally clicked on friend request or liked a post and she blocked you because she put 2 and 2 together.

Basically if you look at somebody's profile you often do leave more of a trail than you think.

Is it an open page? Did you accidentally like something? Are you sure its not a different person with same.name

Maybe she does what I do, which is to block any randomer I don't know.

Probably she didn't know that you had snooped. Maybe as you'd looked at her page your account was recommended to her as a friend and she just blocked it. I tend to block all but family tbh!

I reckon you accidentally added her or liked something

Or maybe your mutual friend let her know you'd been checking up on her

I imagine it's her privacy settings.

Assuming mutual friend isn't 'friends' with old friend on FB (since this would be the obvious reason mutual friend can view old friend's profile and you can't), old friend might have her privacy settings set so that 'friends of friends' can see some information and posts on her profile.

In which case, if mutual friend and old friend have 'friends in common' on FB, mutual friend would be able to see more than you (as you've said you have no personal 'friends' on FB, just business).

It’s much more likely that you came up as a random suggestion under your business name and she blocked that as has no idea why that business was suggested as a “friend”. It’s unlikely she worked out it’s you and then blocked you.

She’s also been blocked now, I’m guessing our names are showing as having clicked on her profile? I didn’t know that was a thing! It wasn’t a malicious thing I just wanted to see from a distance she’d sorted herself out and she has so I’m happy for her, that’s all.

According to Facebook that isn't possible...

m.facebook.com/help/210896588933875/can-i-tell-who%27s-looking-at-my-facebook-profile%3F/?helpref=related_articles&source_cms_id=205685226136386

No, there's no way of knowing that. As said before you either clicked something or came up in 'people you may know'

Bearing in mind your last update, it sounds like she routinely blocks anybody who appears on "people you may know" unless there's an obvious reason for them being there EG lots of friends in common.

According to Facebook you can see who has viewed 'your story'. So if you just looked at her profile or wall then she won't know but if you stalked her story then she will.

www.facebook.com/help/1322453704471759