Laurence Payne wrote:
On 19 Jul 2010 20:58:47 GMT, John Stumbles
wrote:

Having just, with some unease*, bitten the bullet and signed up to
facebook** I'm gobsmacked how many people it suggests as friends,
most of whome I know but some I haven't corresponded with for years.
How does it do it? I haven't offered it my address book but ISTR it
invited me to do that. Is it that everyone else has done so and it's
finding my
email addy in other people's address books and offering links that
way?

I've now deleted*** my 'real' email address which facebook seemed to
have listed for me (how? I didn't give it to them) and am sticking
with a " type address, so theoretically it
shouldn't be able to link people up with me through that, though if
their address books contain my real name alongside my address it may
still be able to guess.


* I have a deep sense of unease that when They come to get Us we'll
have done most of the detective work for them :-

** as myself: I was already on there under a pseudonym

*** ok, I asked fb to delete it: but they could be keeping it but not
telling me


That's what Facebook is for! If you don't want it, don't use it.
Just send emails to the people you want to send them to.

And for building up a vast amount of information that they can 'sell' on to
the various companies that has made the founders of facebook millions of
dollars - along with allowing some rather neferious people to snoop on , and
make use of the sensitive information that many half-baked users post there.

Who in their right mind would post there something along the lines of: "hi
there ********** (insert name[s] of so called and often anonymous friends)
I'm off on my jolly old holidays on ***** (insert day and date) to wherever,
and I'll be away for a fortnight - yahoo!!" - or anything else just as
stupid.

Ah well, many a job has been lost at the interview stage when prospective
employers have gone-a-looking there for information - who needs RIPA when
there's facebook? ;-)

Cash