If you’re a Facebook user and you haven’t ever checked your privacy settings, now is the time. Facebook has been talking about their new search features since January but they have picked this week to roll out the changes.
People always get mad when Facebook makes a change to the layout of the social platform but then we just accept it and move forward with our Facebook lives. This alteration isn’t a total layout change, but you won’t miss it.
Yeah, okay so the concept is kind of cool to be able to find things easier in the world of Facebook but do we really need that? When Facebook “stalking” is already a regularly used term, making it easier for people to spy on other people and their lives seems a little unnecessary.
Here’s the purpose of Graph Search:
You can now type just about any phrase into the search bar and Facebook will gather the information for you. For example, if you type in the phrase “Restaurants my friends like”, you will literally get a list of restaurants that are liked by your friends.
I guess this feature could be helpful, but in the wrong hands it’s just dangerous. This feature gives people the ability to target groups or individuals by their beliefs, the things they like, the places they frequent, and really anything else. Say you are looking for single women in your city. Facebook will populate a list then you will have a buffet to pick from. Thanks Facebook.
The moral of the story here is to use your privacy settings like a shield from the creeps that crawl Facebook using it for the wrong reasons. It’s great to be able to share things with your family or friends but there are strangers watching too!
