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How to permanently delete your Facebook account

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101–110 of 289 posts

Re: How to permanently delete your Facebook account

#101
post #71

I got rid of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp about 4 years ago. Facebook and Instagram was easy, but people who have WhatsApp really think you’re weird for not having it. Deleting WhatsApp, while annoying for me personally, has resulted in many people I know joining Signal or Telegram — the network effect can be broken by being belligerent. If you don’t want to have a conversation about why you deleted WhatsApp, si…

>Deleting WhatsApp, [...], has resulted in many people I know joining Signal or Telegram — the network effect can be broken by being belligerent. This practical application of your advice depends on where a particular person sits in their social hierarchy . E.g. an influential person that's a "hub" or "connector" in their social circle can switch from WhatsApp to Signal ... or insist on email only ... or insist on no…

> because others don't care to switch to reach you.

I don't think it is worth holding contact in that case. Contrary to popular belief is that you don't miss out on anything.

Business contacts are another matter, but every professional understands if you want to use other channels. Same principle applies. If they don't make the effort, it wasn't a good contact anyway, although there are side effects because convinience is important. A bit of excentricity isn't a deal breaker, on the contrary.

Clout chasing is exactly the angle social media tries to satisfy.

Re: How to permanently delete your Facebook account

#102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disagree. - I explicitly check to avoid any "disabling". - The only intent was to permanently delete the account. - You can believe me or not and I did it really careful.

Move to a European country and Sue there for GDPR violation.

Couldnt you transfer your account temporary?

Re: How to permanently delete your Facebook account

#103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disagree. - I explicitly check to avoid any "disabling". - The only intent was to permanently delete the account. - You can believe me or not and I did it really careful.

Move to a European country and Sue there for GDPR violation.

I am in the middle of exactly that process!

Re: How to permanently delete your Facebook account

#104
post #80

I got rid of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp about 4 years ago. Facebook and Instagram was easy, but people who have WhatsApp really think you’re weird for not having it. Deleting WhatsApp, while annoying for me personally, has resulted in many people I know joining Signal or Telegram — the network effect can be broken by being belligerent. If you don’t want to have a conversation about why you deleted WhatsApp, si…

In Europe, people just assume that you have it. I often get the first contact from pensions and airbnbs on WhatsApp. I convinced a few people to switch to Telegram, but there are still a few stragglers on WhatsApp and even Facebook Messenger.

It is sadly very common in western europe, but you can easily live without it too.

Re: How to permanently delete your Facebook account

#105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disagree. - I explicitly check to avoid any "disabling". - The only intent was to permanently delete the account. - You can believe me or not and I did it really careful.

Move to a European country and Sue there for GDPR violation.

You don't need to live in the EU/EEA to invoke GDPR rights. Case in point: the UK authority upheld a US resident's GDPR claim against Cambridge Analytica (and yes, Facebook was involved). https://ico.org.uk/about-the-ico/news-and-events/news-and-bl...

Re: How to permanently delete your Facebook account

#106
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Messaging clients tend to be regional. WhatsApp is massive in Europe. From what I gather WeChat is dominant in mainland China but Hong Kong still used WhatsApp (though I think they might be coming round to Signal?) and the US, who have a higher ratio of Apple users vs the rest of the world, tend to use iMessage a lot more.

Interoperability between these systems should be a public policy goal. I don't have to buy an AT&T phone anymore to call my friends; not sure why I have to buy iOS to chat with them.

What if we made a Internet Standard for messaging and presence?

Re: How to permanently delete your Facebook account

#107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Use mautrix-whatsapp [1] on a home server to bridge Matrix chat to WhatsApp and (optionally) add a dedicated VoIP phone number for WhatApp. Allows you to connect to/chat with WhatApp users using Matrix/Element. [1]: https://github.com/mautrix/whatsapp

Not GP commenter, but I suspect you're mistaking a functional issue (not wanting to use Whatsapp's applications) from a moral issue (not wanting to use the Whatsapp platform).

Somewhat you are right - but it is difficult to differentiate between the two: I don't want to use Whatsapp for moral issues, but I also a) don't want to loose connections to people who still use the platform and b) I don't believe in actiely convincing peole of anything. They have to reach these conclusions themselves - until then, I can choose mautrix to stay connected, limiting my interaction with the platform to the bare minimum.

Re: How to permanently delete your Facebook account

#108
post #53

Why would I want to delete my Facebook account? I abhor Facebook, I never log on, I haven’t used WhatsApp or Facebook messenger, etc. for several years, So I don’t feel like I’m giving them any information, but deleting my account only hurts me by giving away a free option? What am I missing?

The way to fight people who advise to use FB less or just don't login and scroll all day long, is to reframe the problem as an extremist binary choice, either use FB three hours per day every day or go to huge effort to delete everything. Most people will choose the less extreme of the "binary" options of continuing to use FB. Its a common sophistry trick.

Re: How to permanently delete your Facebook account

#109
post #46

The irony here that it's harder to delete your HN account and all your comments

HN has anonymous accounts and personally identifiable information can be hidden or removed by the user, which to me has the same effect. HN complains to me that I cannot reset my pwd if I ever forget it because I didn't even share my mail.

People often claim anonymous platforms are doomed to fail but I think social media is the main problem currently.

Re: How to permanently delete your Facebook account

#110

The situation is quite interesting here. - Imagine, you're living outside of USA/UK/Europe. - Formally, it's possible to proceed with "Permanently delete my account". - You will even receive email assuring you that two weeks later profile would be completely deleted. - Then, couple years later you'll occasionally seen email from facebook that someone tried to log in into your ("permanently deleted") account. - You'll…

They lie about everything else, why would this be different?
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