Many started to worry about the safety of their social media accounts after it was disclosed that Cambridge Analytica, a political consulting business connected to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, had gained access to the personal info of fifty million users of Facebook.
Index
Your brief bio can be found in a file with the cryptic name Index. Your name, date of birth, registration date, emails, phones, current city, hometown, family members (I added my friend as a family member many years ago for fun, and she’s still included in the list FB gave me), previous relationships (fortunately, Facebook knows only the ones you’ve explicitly stated in the relationship status, but it saves all of them as far back or fake they might be), your education, and your employment history are all on your Facebook page and its settings. If you are an administrator for any pages, you will find relevant details there as well.
Not too weird thus far.
Messages
Messages sent and received on Facebook are permanently archived. God alone knows why, but the GIFs, emojis, and audio messages you sent are also kept in their own files.
Photos
The Photographs section stores all the images you’ve ever posted to the site, along with relevant metadata such as the IP address the images were uploaded from and detailed information on the camera or phone used to take them. There’s also a connection to Facebook’s stored face recognition data. It’s completely devoid of information except from some mystery statistics that Facebook uses to identify your face among thousands in a matter of seconds.
To your surprise, there are actually no pictures with your name in the caption. If you have any concerns about the privacy of your Facebook data, Facebook claims that you should contact the original uploader instead.
Videos
It works the same way in the Videos section. You may still find footage from even five years ago. Facebook will still have the video you filmed but never uploaded.
Friends
Your current friends list, with the dates of their addition, is here, as is a list of those you’ve unfriended, of those you’ve made friend requests to, of those you follow, and of those who follow you.
As you may have seen, there is no way to see who has defriended you.
Applications Presetup
There are several programmes that you should definitely look at. Most of these are probably already on your radar; I know that was the case with my own experience. Another, “I bet I can figure out your favourite colour in 7 questions,” doesn’t even seem like an application, yet it was there too.
The information an app needs from you is often presented during the installation process. Your public profile, friends list, and email address are examples of this. Whenever an app asks for permission to use your microphone or camera, think hard before giving it that permission.
Events
Facebook keeps track of everything that happens in the world that involves you. In addition to the basic information such as time and location, it also records detailed descriptions of occurrences. Whatever is recorded in the account of the actual occurrences. Throughout my college years, most of my were spent at parties. I confess, it was entertaining to go through dozens of pages detailing Beer Pong regulations and alcohol pricing.
Ads
You may see Facebook’s suggestions for what you might find interesting under the Advertising menu. Facebook tailors the advertisements you see to your interests. Several of these made sense to me. Based on my preferences, I could see how they may be useful, such as my likes, shares, events attended, and even posts. Some of them were chosen at random. Technology, schools I attended, places I’ve travelled to several times, tea (which I don’t think I’ve mentioned on Facebook, but fine), bars (that’s mean, Facebook), anthropology, witchcraft (? ), futsal (I don’t even enjoy sports), and the whole history of the Muse band online were all covered.
Without a doubt, Facebook remembers the advertisements you clicked on so that it may provide you more relevant advertising in the future. Nevertheless, it appears that they just keep track of your Facebook clicks for the most recent few months and not forever.
Companies that have your contact information are more likely to contact you.
Advertisers who have your contact information make up the other useful file. My choices, Uber, Uber Eats (which I think gets its data from Uber), and AirBnB, need no explanation. Some have noted that bands frequently turn out to include user’s contact details, but while following dozens of bands myself, I have not found this to be the case.
Security
Also, there’s this new “security” file, which is, to be honest, really eerie. It details every time and place you’ve logged into Facebook, along with the IP address, browser, and device details. Keeping track of your whereabouts is insanely simple if you’re one of those folks that logs in every day.
Timeline
Deleted items from your timeline are still stored in your Facebook data, as would be anticipated. In addition, all of your Facebook wall comments.