There's a current trend on social media that involves, well, deleting your Facebook account. Shocking, right? But in light of recent news that Cambridge Analytica, a consulting firm that worked for the Trump campaign, had access to millions of users' Facebook data, people seem keen on removing themselves from the addictive platform. (If you want to get into the specifics of the scandal, Vox has a great explainer.)
But another related trend seems to be downloading your own Facebook data to see what the company has stored about you. This morning, I saw a few people tweet about it and decided, why not, I'll jump on the bandwagon. All you do is go to your Facebook Settings and click "Download a copy of your Facebook data."
I thought that maybe the information would come in some sort of complicated CSV file but nope, it's quite easy to read. Thanks, Zuckerberg. Now let's parse (lolz coding jokes) through this:
The HTML section seems pretty standard, though I was a little bothered to click on "ads" and see the list of, what I can only assume are, topics that help companies serve me targeted ads. Some of mine included "Coffeehouses," "Food," and "Shopping." So at least they're accurate.
Then I opened up "security," a document that included tons of IP addresses. I'm no expert, so I can't tell you exactly what this page means. And obviously I know in my head that every time I log into Facebook, they know where I'm logging in from, but seeing it all laid out like that was a little off-putting.
Some of the other information was pretty standard: all the events I've RSVP'd to, including "2009 Free Cone Day," all the people who've sent me friend requests, all the friends I've declined (harsh), my messages, photos, videos, and my timeline. If you're bored this weekend, please download your own and read what people used to write on timelines back in 2008 because WOW.
But here comes the real head-scratcher: "Contact_info." To be honest, this was the page I was interested in; I'd heard there might be a list of your phone contacts, and I wanted to know if it was true.
Spoiler: It is! Unfortunately, I cannot put a screenshot here as I must protect the lives of my innocent friends and past Tinder dates, but there is a list of people with their phone numbers.
To give some background, I do not have the Facebook app downloaded on my phone. I used to years ago and recently re-downloaded to film a Facebook Live for this very website. But typically, I don't. I just use the mobile site on my phone. Could Facebook have gathered my contacts the single week when I briefly downloaded the app? It's possible. But beyond that, this is what I think is going on. The list that I'm looking at has both people in my contacts and people not in my contacts, which presumably means it's a combination of what is currently saved on my phone and what was previously saved on my phone.
For example, let's go back to the Tinder date. He is indeed on this list and is saved in my phone, though we are not friends on Facebook because I am not a monster. However, let's take my friend's fiancé, James (hi James!). I just checked, and I do not have his number saved to my phone (bye James), and he does not list his number directly on Facebook. Did I used to have his number? Did he used to have his number listed on Facebook? These are all possibilities, but either way you slice it, FACEBOOK STILL HAS A LIST OF ALL MY CONTACTS.
I can't say there were any more interesting tidbits in the data, except for some surely embarrassing photos of me, but this experiment has left me wondering about the unknown digital landscape underneath our curated timelines. What else is hiding under there? Will Zuckerberg testify to Congress? Will I eventually delete my Facebook and go off the grid like Viggo Mortensen in Captain Fantastic? It's hard to say. Though I bet the people who buy Facebook ads—and maybe James—could tell you.
