
Facebook Location History View - jsonne
https://www.facebook.com/location_history/view/
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tremendo
For this only the notice that it's turned off comes up for me. Great. Alas
it's Google that knows everywhere I've been
[https://google.com/maps/timeline?pb](https://google.com/maps/timeline?pb)

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rococode
Wow, they (Google) really keep everything.. They've still got my trip to
Europe from 5 years ago on there, not sure how that's useful to them at this
point haha.

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ebikelaw
They keep it because it's useful to you, not because it's useful to them.
You're just looking at it too cynically.

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stevenicr
I must disagree. Spending some time thinking how this info is useful to the
end user as opposed to the data watcher / holder. I believe that this data is
exponentially less useful for the end user as it is for the persons
adversaries.

Cell phone companies for example may have legitimate reasons to keep location
data for billing disputes for 60 days or so, but holding that data longer
makes it available to all kinds of agencies, law enforcers and those with that
kind of access who would abuse that access, marketing groups, divorce lawyers,
accident attorneys, all kinds of possible things that are detrimental to the
end user.

The data companies profit from sharing this data, and it costs the end user.
Whatever benefits one can come up with, I think the scale is obviously tipped
in the "more useful against you" than "for you" direction when it comes to
long term location storage.

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ebikelaw
The phone company doesn't hold it for you on your behalf; they don't have some
frontend where you can query and see it. Google does hold it on your behalf.
It's used for you in Google Maps to surface places you regularly go over
places you've never been. This is why "directions to the pizza place" works.
Location history is also used to automatically deduce your home, work, or
school location, so you can use a command like "navigate to school" with
Android Auto, or get traffic alerts along your normal routes, just as
examples.

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deft
When is facebook going to release a "shadow profile view". I can't delete the
data they have on me because they don't even let me access it, despite
publicly admitting to having it.

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Keloo
No company in the world can handle such bandwidth :D

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nataz
One of the many reasons I didn't like the mandatory FB app install on some
Verizon android phones. You couldn't even delete it if you wanted to. Best
case scenario was to never log in.

Ironically, I currently own a Pixel 2XL, have multiple google homes and
chromecasts, use gmail, photos, etc., and let them run wild with my
permissions.

I think for me Google has created an ecosystem that I get a lot of value out
of. I can't tell you how many times my phone has automatically given me
pertinent information about a trip, or when to leave for work, or how to route
around an accident. There is so much value for me, that I'm willing to trade
my personal info.

FB on the other hand just seems like a vampire most of the time. All I want to
do is keep in touch with a few friends. It's even more egregious since I'm old
enough to be in the first year cohort of FB rolling out, and have had to live
with the ever increasing privacy intrusions.

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peterbraden
I asked for a full facebook data export, and this data wasn't in the bundle
they gave me.

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alexh1
Just checked my facebook data export and the location_history folder just
contains the file no-data.txt

My location history is also turned off on facebook.

Just another data point

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tantalor
This is pretty surprising seeing as how I have disallowed Facebook apps'
permission to access my location.

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hharnisch
I switched from the native Facebook app to the web app in 2014 -- which is the
last location Facebook has on me. I guess this explains why deleting the app
gave me double the battery life.

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SmellyGeekBoy
My experience too. If you absolutely must use Facebook, at least use the
mobile site instead of the app.

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spondyl
I know from my past data exports on Android (pre-Cambridge Analytica) that my
location history was pretty precise at all times. Same deal with Google Maps
but I was aware of it so that's not really a complaint.

I tried looking for the location history feature on my iPhone and I honestly
can't find it. Visiting the location history view just says my history is
disabled and the web client doesn't seem to have that setting anywhere either
apparently?

I don't even know why I have the thing installed in the first place. My
timeline is complete garbage (people resharing bad memes) and I only use
Messenger.

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reaperducer
_> I tried looking for the location history feature on my iPhone and I
honestly can't find it._

It's always fun to look at the places your iPhone thinks you frequent:

>Settings >Privacy >Location Services >System Services > Significant Locations

I stop at a particular traffic light on the way to work most days, and the
phone thinks I like to hang out at the pawn shop on the corner.

As far as anyone knows, all of this information is only known to the phone,
and not to Apple. But it's still creepy to see how a little box in your pocket
watches you day and night.

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dawnerd
"Location History is off. Turning on Location History lets you explore what's
around you, get more relevant ads, and help improve Facebook. It allows
Facebook to build a history of precise locations received through your device.
Your Location History is private and secure. You can manage it in your
location settings at any time. "

Yeah I don't think I'll be enabling it.

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rdl
Deleting the FB mobile app, replacing it with Friendly+ (which scrapes the web
app to provide a fairly equivalent experience, plus blocks ads and other
stuff) was a great choice.

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a_rahmanshah
How does it have my location history? I don't have their app on my phone.
Maybe through FB Messenger?

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cgb223
Its frozen for me. Just keeps spinning the first 8th of the spin animation and
glitching back to the start

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kraig
For someone who has deleted their FB account, what is this?

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jlmorton
Android user here. I won't make any claims about any permissions I've granted
Facebook, but this link leads to a location view that shows my history with
frequent updates each and every day from 2015 until this year, apparently
every time I moved somewhere.

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marzell
I am appalled at the apparent ignorance/disbelief in so many comments from
people who don't find it obvious that location history data from Google/FB is
useful and profitable for them to have.

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cjhopman
I am appalled at the apparent ignorance/disbelief in so many comments from
people who don't find it obvious that location history data from Google/FB can
be used to improve the user experience.

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peterbraden
Can you give some examples? Normally I find that location data makes my user
experience worse, for example assuming the language I speak based on the
country, or redirecting me away from the url I was trying to go to.

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foobaw
It's not always individualistic. Facebook can determine where users travel to
and when. There are more complex cohort analysis and segmentation that's being
done but a lot of the data can help drive business strategy.

