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How Facebook knows who you might be dating online

bbc.co.uk

21–30 of 64 posts

Re: How Facebook knows who you might be dating online

#21
post #7

The thing that I find most interesting about this article is the displayed approach towards privacy management. People quoted in this article reveal little about themselves in a dating network, and don't want to give enough information to make it possible to guess their real identity. Facebook destroys this concept by suggesting dating matches as potential facebook friends, making it possible for their dating matches…

There is still stigma with online dating and people don't want people they know to identify them there.

Re: How Facebook knows who you might be dating online

#23
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can somewhat confirm that Facebook at least collects this data. Using rooted android you can make a seperate permission dialog pop up every time an app tries to access certain APIs. Despite having all GPS related features of Facebook and its messenger disabled, the Facebook Messenger app tries to access my GPS location at seemingly random times.

> Despite having all GPS related features of Facebook and its messenger disabled, the Facebook Messenger app tries to access my GPS location at seemingly random times. This is troubling, and goes against the Play Store's terms and conditions for app developers. I suppose Facebook gets a pass on it through some unspoken agreement with Google, though.

do you really think that is possible ?

Re: How Facebook knows who you might be dating online

#25
Here's my theory on how Facebook can be telling the truth here:

Your Tinder/Grindr matches are people in your local area. Your Facebook social graph contains people in your local area, even ones you don't know, through your local friends. The chances of one or several Tinder matches eventually intersecting with your Facebook graph are significant. When this happens, people interpret it as a deliberate act, not just a coincidence.

If you use Tinder in an area which does not contain any of your friends, and people from that area subsequently show up, and have no connection to any of your friends, that would be a lot more suspicious.

Re: How Facebook knows who you might be dating online

#26

Something similar happened to me on Facebook. There was someone I was meeting in real life but we had absolutely no FB connections. No mutual friends. And I didn't even know she was on Facebook. Suddenly I saw her on my 'Suggested friends' list. The only reasonable explanation is that she found me on Facebook and viewed my profile. Facebook saved the incident and suggested her to me as a friend. Facebook forgets noth…

> Facebook forgets nothing. Nothing. Export your Facebook data and check out they keep your message history with everyone forever . https://www.facebook.com/help/131112897028467/

Good. I don't see why those should be deleted. You can access it from the web interface, too.

Unfortunately they do not have chat logs from before 2011, when chat and messages were merged.

Re: How Facebook knows who you might be dating online

#27
> He says this whole issue is mainly down to your phone number.

> Facebook goes through your phone book ... you give it permission to do this when you install the app.

This is 100% demonstrably false. It literally comes down to advertising/tracking.

Because tinder is ad-supported for the free app, they're sending data directly to advertising networks (of which Facebook is one), and that's being used to track you. Period.

On iPhones an app specifically has to ask for permission to read your contacts beforehand. There's nothing "implicit" about that, you literally have to agree it explicitly.

I really wish the COO at a Security research company wouldn't spew nonsense. And people wonder why the general public is misinformed as to the harm of advertisers/tracking.

Re: How Facebook knows who you might be dating online

#28

The Facebook app on iOS isn't listed as having requested access to my contacts. Is this just an Android thing? Or does the app have some way of sneakily getting access?

Contacts is accessible by "Messenger" on mine, the Facebook app itself doesn't provide contact sync.

Re: How Facebook knows who you might be dating online

#29

Something similar happened to me on Facebook. There was someone I was meeting in real life but we had absolutely no FB connections. No mutual friends. And I didn't even know she was on Facebook. Suddenly I saw her on my 'Suggested friends' list. The only reasonable explanation is that she found me on Facebook and viewed my profile. Facebook saved the incident and suggested her to me as a friend. Facebook forgets noth…

> Facebook forgets nothing. Nothing. Export your Facebook data and check out they keep your message history with everyone forever . https://www.facebook.com/help/131112897028467/

You will not find information or content that you have deleted because this is deleted from Facebook servers.

https://www.facebook.com/help/405183566203254

So if you delete it, it won't be in the download.

Re: How Facebook knows who you might be dating online

#30
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Facebook forgets nothing. Nothing. Export your Facebook data and check out they keep your message history with everyone forever . https://www.facebook.com/help/131112897028467/

You will not find information or content that you have deleted because this is deleted from Facebook servers. https://www.facebook.com/help/405183566203254 So if you delete it, it won't be in the download.

Can you delete entire Facebook Message conversations?
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