
Facebook uses location to suggest new friends - braythwayt
http://fusion.net/story/319108/facebook-phone-location-friend-suggestions/
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0xmohit
I'm not sure if it is either new or surprising.

I did an experiment some 3 years back from within a corporate network -- the
difference being that it was done on a desktop, not mobile. The sequence of
events was roughly:

\- Spin off a new VM

\- Create a brand new email address with fictitious identity

\- Sign up to Facebook using the newly created fictitious identity

Result: The suggested "friends" were folks in that building (who were on the
same network).

(The experiment was performed to demo how creepy such networks are.)

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brett40324
Nice:)

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ourmandave
How awkward would it be when the FBI agents parked in the van outside your
house keep popping up on your suggested friends list?

~~~
gmarx
Genius. Let's write that screenplay!

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alistairSH
I don't understand why people use the Facebook native app at all. Their mobile
website works quite well and should avoid many of the issues with the app
(location sharing, battery drain, etc).

~~~
drcross
Facebook recently disabled their messenger platform on the website, when you
click the messages tab it brings you directly to the app store to install
their app. This means you have to use the App to message people. The app
requires such egregious permissions that I absolutely refuse to install it.
It's a shame because it worked perfectly in the past.

~~~
jmspring
I've been able to use
[https://mbasic.facebook.com](https://mbasic.facebook.com) from an Android
device for messaging. Not ideal, but better than installing one of their apps.

~~~
noxToken
If you have Chrome for Android (only browser/device I've tested this on) you
can check request desktop site for
[https://m.facebook.com](https://m.facebook.com). You'll stay on the mobile
version, maintain all of the mobile functionality of the website plus access
to messages without the download redirect.

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thirdsun
I really thought this was already a well-established and known fact. I saw
friend suggestions quite often after attending events where I ran into very
loose acquaintances I never spoke to but share a few friends with. That by
itself isn't too surprising, but the fact that this happens after we were
geographically close led me to believe that this is common knowledge.

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ulli
Goddamned Facebook!! Creating environments filled with unintended consequences
everyday of the week.

There are so many untrained, misguided, semi-literate people in the world, who
just get thrown into these environments totally unprepared. It literally
sickens me.

Sorry I woke up today morning to read this -
[http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/salem/21-yr-old-
woma...](http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/salem/21-yr-old-woman-
commits-suicide-after-morphed-photo-appears-on-
Facebook/articleshow/52948971.cms)

Parents get blamed. Police get blamed. Govts get blamed. Blame goes around.
People get defensive rather than constructive. What a mess! Seriously how the
fuck is anyone supposed to be prepared technically and socially to deal with
this stuff?

~~~
jasonkostempski
That's a shitty story, but blaming Facebook for it seems a bit of a stretch.
By that logic, photo editing software is responsible; computers; electricity,
etc. A horrible society is definitley responsible for that one.

~~~
tdkl
Yes, horrible society that overvalues a social networking site in every aspect
in our lives.

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netman21
Linkedin does this too. It suggested that I connect with an academic copy
editor. My only other connection? We sat next to each other at a co-working
space. Of course Linkedin was not using geo-location. They must have noticed
that we were both on the same network.

~~~
cylinder
I can't think of a single reason to use LinkedIn's native app.

~~~
fps
linkedin's IP based tracking includes their website, and doesn't require you
to share your location through the browser. They've been doing that for years.
If you share a network gateway with someone, LinkedIn will suggest that person
as a contact.

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creshal
> Facebook uses location to suggest new friends–which could be a privacy
> disaster

No, the privacy disaster happened when Facebook was allowed to collect all
that data in the first place.

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akerro
What if I moved out from a neighbourhood because I had enemies there, we
didn't like each other? Now I'm coming back to my parents house and facebook
reminds me about them and them about me?

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gmarx
Do you have enemies? Does a typical person have enemies?

~~~
zaccus
It's not unheard of to have people in your extended network who you would
rather not have alerted to your whereabouts. Examples: abusive ex, clingy co-
worker, mother in law, etc. "Enemy" is a rather melodramatic term but you get
the idea.

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HBreakhh
I don't expect anything to Facebook when it comes to privacy.

~~~
braythwayt
Well, there are several levels of non-privacy to expect:

    
    
      - Facebook collects data about me
      - Facebook shares my data with big corporations who want to sell me stuff
      - Facebook shares my data with my friends
      - Facebook shares my data with people who aren't my friends
    

For many people, this is a surprising escalation of their expectations. For
some, it is outright dangerous.

~~~
m0v_eax
Because people expect services as robust and useful as Facebook to be free?
Based on how much time people spend using their service, the user's data is
hardly a large price to pay. Have certain types of things you like,
profession, education, gender, demographic and expect your profile able to be
targeted (anonymously) with advertising. Share something public (including
anything above), expect any corporation to be able to see or mine it.

~~~
braythwayt
I think your comment is in line with mine. Many people think they are making a
trade-off: The use of the service in exchange for data that corporations can
mine.

Some even consider this a win-win, as they believe that they will receive
advertising for things they may actually want to buy.

However, not everybody expects the data to be shared with other users of the
service. This is why I suggested that this may be an unexpected escalation of
expectations. Facebook is quite transparent about sharing your data with
advertisers.

It is less transparent about sharing your data with other individuals.

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guard-of-terra
Just yesterday somebody warned that Facebook does location-based friends
suggestion (was suggested to friend a taxi driver) and promptly accused to be
tin foil hatter.

That's just how it goes every time.

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jedberg
They probably aren't using location but IP block. In fact, I'm almost certain
your IP block is used for both suggested friends and your Newsfeed.

I used to see my coworkers all the time in my Newsfeed, but now that I don't
work there (and therefore we don't share an IP anymore) I suddenly started
seeing them a lot less.

I go to their page and see they are posting, and after interacting with a few
posts they started showing up again, but I have to go to their page and
interact every few weeks to get them to keep showing up.

Also, whenever I go and visit the old office, if I use Facebook there, all of
a sudden I get them all showing up in my Newsfeed again.

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wastedhours
"Location information by itself doesn’t indicate that two people might be
friends" \- interesting, and guessing it was IP based so they might put more
weight behind it, but I keep getting this for an ex-housemate. Nothing else in
common, no common friends, just the fact we were both regularly in the same
place/same network.

~~~
xuhu
The man from the article attended a common event with the other man who
appeared on his friends suggestion list. Maybe facebook has a rule that if the
event is small, the attendees can be assumed to have met IRL.

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m0v_eax
I love it. I've wished this feature implemented for quite some time.

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zeeshanm
They also suggest friends based on who has viewed your profile.

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pmlnr
Or it may result in real-world friendships.

Too bad I don't have the Facebook app installed any more.

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skynetv2
i never use facebook on mobile devices, i have a different "supervised"
profile on Chrome for facebook use and nothing else.

i use it because of how many people are on there, but i wont let them snoop on
me

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0xmohit
Do you need anybody else to snoop upon you if you're using Chrome?

Has Google stopped identifying a given Chrome installation using unique IDs?

