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Original poster

to be horrified that people may know I've viewed their Facebook page?

348 replies

icouldjusteatacroissant · 12/10/2015 14:05

Facebook deny it, but there's massive talk on the net that if you look at someone's page, you pop up on their suggested list or people you may know list. Maybe not straight away, but you do appear at some point

Am I the only one who looks at their ex's or whoevers pages, photos, etc?

I am horrified they may know I've been snooping Shock

OP posts:
LeaveMyWingsBehindMe · 13/10/2015 03:51

I spent the evening going through my list of 'people you might know' and I can account for all of them. They are either FOFs, or people whose emails I have or people who I have searched out and do indeed know, but haven't sent FRs to, or there is some other online connection that explains it.

There isn't a single person known to me of old that I haven't searched out myself. Yet I'm sure if I look up old school friends and boyfriends and colleagues I am not the only one and surely someone else is also searching for me.

LeaveMyWingsBehindMe · 13/10/2015 03:59

On the other hand, I do think that fm possibly send FRs to people. I have woken up twice to 'so and so has accepted your friends request' and I had no recollection of ever sending them. But they were people I knew and saw fairly often and had friends in common with though.

MargoReadbetter · 13/10/2015 04:01

I don't think its true either. I have had suggestions for people I know I've never snooped on and whom I know would have no interest in snooping on me. Some in a professional capacity but I mean this in the widest sense, think email cc-ed to a hundred people.

MargoReadbetter · 13/10/2015 04:02

Yes to the random friends request!

RoseInTheRain · 13/10/2015 04:12

It is true. Explain this:

I set up a fake account with fake email address etc. I use it for snooping.

I look up the fake account with my real account (just to check everything is locked down).

Upon logging back in to the fake account, I get a "People you may know" suggestion, of my real account...

LeaveMyWingsBehindMe · 13/10/2015 04:43

But Rose that might be because you are using the same device or IP address.

NaughtToThreeSadOnions · 13/10/2015 05:16

mutton is your landlord local like in the same town I often get suggestions of people I've never actually heard of definitely not snooped cis I've never heard of them no friends, groups or likes in common then when I look their in the same town as I live in.

This is a recurring thing on here, I'm another one that hopes its not true, but then as I do have mutual friends with the person in real life just not on fb I'm damn sure it would be mentioned.

LeaveMyWingsBehindMe · 13/10/2015 05:21

I've just checked my fake profile and I am not suggested as a friend for myself. Grin

wannaBe · 13/10/2015 06:12

I snoop on people's fb profiles all the time. not the same people all the time, but people I might come across, in life, or people being mentioned, or once someone I know had an interview so I went looking for the fb profiles of the pannel, one of them was a Ukip supporter Shock

IMO it's not actually snooping, if people have their fb profiles public to the point that anyone can view their every update, the pictures and tags to their children, check-ins at their home address, then really they're fair game if someone wants to look at their profile. Privacy settings are there for a reason, and whenever you write a post fb states very clearly who it will be shared with i.e. friends/friends of friends/public.

It never ceases to amaze me how much information people are prepared to put out there in the public domain though.

But if it happened that I came up on someone's people you may know as a result of me looking at their profile, then really I'm not that bothered. I mean what's the worst that can happen?

Senpai · 13/10/2015 06:45

People are on your suggestions list because of common friends. Otherwise you'd get creepy internet stalker as a friend suggestion.

There's second degree friends who are friends of friends who get recommended.

There's third degree friends who are friend's of the 2nd degree friends. They sometimes make it in too.

So... You'd have to be pretty paranoid to think a suggested person is there because they're stalking you and not because you have people you may know in common.

SoupDragon · 13/10/2015 07:29

You'd have to be pretty paranoid to think a suggested person is there because they're stalking you

You do understand the difference between stalking and "looking at someone's profile" don't you? I was under the impression that posters were talking about the latter, which is actually perfectly reasonable idea even if it isn't true.

IKnowIAmButWhatAreYou · 13/10/2015 08:13

Personally I think it's more interesting to look at the email aspect of it.

I've had "you might know this person" for someone I bought a motorbike off of in 2009.

I wasn't on FB then, haven't got his mobile number and haven't emailed him since 2009.

Somewhere in Google is a record that I emailed him and he emailed me and Google have shared that with FB (and no doubt anyone else they sell their databases to).

It doesn't bother me because FB is just a tool & my page is locked down tight, but I wonder if his initial reaction was "F*ck, how did it know that?" like mine was!! Grin

noblegiraffe · 13/10/2015 08:57

Oh not emailing him since 2009 isn't a problem. If it's the email address you signed up to Facebook with, they'll know who you have ever emailed with from that address.

suzannecaravaggio · 13/10/2015 09:35

Does anyone actually know how the algorithm used by FB to generate 'people you may know' works?
?
Unless you are privy to that information I don't see how you can say.

Pretty sure FB keeps things like that a secret ?

Also how is it snooping to look a a webpage, it's not as if you hacked into an email account, it's a public profile ?

ConstanceMarkYaBitch · 13/10/2015 09:51

*It is true. Explain this:

I set up a fake account with fake email address etc. I use it for snooping.

I look up the fake account with my real account (just to check everything is locked down).

Upon logging back in to the fake account, I get a "People you may know" suggestion, of my real account...*

oh come on, that one is easy? Surely you don't need telling how that suggestion was made?

TennesseeMountainPointOfView · 13/10/2015 09:56

Re the random friend requests, there used to be an option when you joined facebook for it to send friend requests to everyone in your email contacts, however if your contacts did not have an account, they would get an email invitation to join FB. If they at any point join FB with that email address, they will then get a friend request from you, because you had told FB (maybe not intentionally, but you'd done it anyway) that you wanted to be friends with that person.

If you joined up a while ago, you may well have allowed this option without realising - it wasn't always terribly clear what it did, and it has definitely been tightened up with various privacy updates since.

SionnachDana · 13/10/2015 10:08

' constance
Same ISP address?

But..... I SEND out letters with my name at the end of them (for work) and some of the names I send letters to, they later pop up on my suggestions. My name is not that common(my sur name that is). I believe that occasionally these people who I'm contacting for work reasons search my name.

I will not be told (and people have tried!!!) that I actually do know these people/am connected to them if I only realised it.

These are completely random people who have nothing to do with me. They don't have my number in their phone, nor I theirs. I've never emailed them.

One man, I'd seen him out cycling right, saw him regularly for years. Out on his bike. He'd smile sometimes. Then, he came in to my work by chance, found out my name, a few days later he popped up in my ''people you may know''. Nobody could ''reassure'' me that snooping doesn't make your name come up as a suggestion in their fb. I'm so careful now. I still snoop a bit! but only if we have mutual friends.

SionnachDana · 13/10/2015 10:16

ps, bit extreme to say that it is categorically not true!! If you are happily reassured that it's not true then fine, but I'm not reassured. That doesn't make me an hysteric.

I just know that there is no connection between me and some of the people FB has suggested to me. I can explain away most of the suggestions. Using same IP address, they have my mobile number, I've emailed them, mutual friend, member of the same group. But as it happens, I use an old email address for fb, not my current email address. I'm not a member of any huge groups with thousands of people in them. No. Sometimes it can't be explained by any other factor than that person's searching for you. I don't why accepting this likelihood makes one hysterical or paranoid constance. It's a logical conclusion.

IKnowIAmButWhatAreYou · 13/10/2015 10:53

they'll know who you have ever emailed with from that address.

Definitely!

noblegiraffe · 13/10/2015 11:14

I said this on the last thread. I work in a school. After I accessed Facebook at school with location services enabled, my people you might know list suddenly had kids I don't teach and people who work at the school whose names I recognise on it.

That's not because they have looked a my page (they wouldn't be able to find it!) but because Facebook has seen us in the same location and put us together that way.

So no mutual friends, no phone or email contact, and we're not in the same groups (I have no info on my account), it came from our shared location.

ConstanceMarkYaBitch · 13/10/2015 11:43

It's not extreme to tell you that it is categorically not true. I know this for a fact, since I know precisely how it does work.

No. Sometimes it can't be explained by any other factor than that person's searching for you

No. Sometimes YOU can't explain it any other way. That doesn't mean it can't be explained any other way. You know when a good magician does a trick and you can't think of anyway they could have tricked you? There is still a way, you just can't work it out. It's not actual magic.

It's not as simple as mutual friends, or contact lists, or phone numbers, or locations. It's a complicated (in one way, simple in another) process that combines all of these and more.

BakewellStart · 13/10/2015 11:55

Although I agree it can be totally cringey for someone to know you have been looking at their FB page, the reality is probably 99.9% of people who have FB have at some point used it to snoop and look up their ex's,their ex's new partners, maybe family, neighbours,work colleagues and who ever else they want to have a nosey at.

There is nothing more dissapointing than a well locked down FB profile when in snoop mode! Grin

Most people have used FB to snoop at some point. They have probably looked you up at some point and if they havnt already they probably would at some point!

Dont be mortified - you are actually in with the masses!!

suzannecaravaggio · 13/10/2015 12:06

It's a complicated (in one way, simple in another) process that combines all of these and more
please Constance please do tell
please :)

SionnachDana · 13/10/2015 12:14

Constance !!! You're operating from the arrogant position that you understand all of these things better than the people who disagree with you do.

NOPE. I understand perfectly well.

It's not magic It's not even ''good magic''. The most logical explanation really is that that person searched for me.

ItsAllGoingToBeFine · 13/10/2015 12:15

I suspect this may have already been posted, but this is aa good explanation:
www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2015/04/02/how-facebook-knows-who-all-your-friends-are-even-better-than-you-do/