Facebook 'out of the blue' friend requests

axisus

I'm sure we all get them - A friend request from a beautiful girl in a different country, no info anywhere else on the profile except a couple more pictures of them, and a few plonker 'friends' who have accepted the request.

What's that all about? Surely some kind of scam or information harvesting, but I'm not sure what it would be?

fretmeister

You could just refuse them and not worry about it.

Chalky

You're just a tempted dirty old man! Stop trying to claim 'intellectual interest' or worse, 'research'...

CHRISB50

They are better on Instagram. More to look at normally.

axisus

fretmeister said:

You could just refuse them and not worry about it.

Yes, I do refuse them, I'm just wondering what purpose they serve for the creator? I'm 99.9% certain that in most cases the photos are not of the person who sets it up.

Nikko

I got one yesterday from someone called 'Pei Pei Lee' and the profile picture is the bottom half of what I assume is a young lady wearing high heeled thigh length boots.

I refused...

fretmeister

axisus said:

fretmeister said:

You could just refuse them and not worry about it.

Yes, I do refuse them, I'm just wondering what purpose they serve for the creator? I'm 99.9% certain that in most cases the photos are not of the person who sets it up.

Access to your friends list and information for marketing purposes. Selling your info onwards.

Just like many smart phone apps get permission to harvest your contact list and numbers.

randella

Slightly more sinister, I've had 'requests' from people I'm already friends with, about three in the last week.  There seems to be a mild spate of account hacking going on at the moment.

Col_Decker

I get them on instagram quite often, maybe 2 or 3 a week. I guess they are spammy requests unless the world IS actually full of super hot women who love pictures of me fishing.

UnclePsychosis

The ones I find weirder are the requests from real people, but who have absolutely no reason to add you. For instance, parents of an old University friend who I haven't seen for five years and barely interact with on Facebook. Or a friend's Aunt who *they* barely see and I've never met.

I always thought it was just people pushing the "add friend" button by accident but it seems to happen quite a lot.

Fretwired

axisus said:

I'm sure we all get them - A friend request from a beautiful girl in a different country, no info anywhere else on the profile except a couple more pictures of them, and a few plonker 'friends' who have accepted the request.

What's that all about? Surely some kind of scam or information harvesting, but I'm not sure what it would be?

In reality it's a fat bald bloke using his iPad whilst having a shit which a stock photo of a pretty girl .. fix that image in your brain and you can ignore/reject them.

digitalscream

randella said:

Slightly more sinister, I've had 'requests' from people I'm already friends with, about three in the last week.  There seems to be a mild spate of account hacking going on at the moment.

Doesn't have to be hacking at all - they just look at profiles with a lot of public info, download the profile pic and use it to set up a new account with the exact same name. When you confirm the friend request, they grab hold of your profile and all the available info, then rinse and repeat.

Very effective way of making massive lists of contact info, which is then sellable.

randella

digitalscream said:

randella said:

Slightly more sinister, I've had 'requests' from people I'm already friends with, about three in the last week.  There seems to be a mild spate of account hacking going on at the moment.

Doesn't have to be hacking at all - they just look at profiles with a lot of public info, download the profile pic and use it to set up a new account with the exact same name. When you confirm the friend request, they grab hold of your profile and all the available info, then rinse and repeat.

Very effective way of making massive lists of contact info, which is then sellable.

@digitalscream - "Cloning", then.

You do know that hauling a man up on his vocabulary on a Monday is listed as 'inhumane' under the Geneva Convention?

Or at least it should be.

RobDavies

I've had a few recently....  Totally gorgeous girls with vast bristols and plenty of flesh on show.

So, I click on the photo's and then the "mutual" friends list.   

Our mutual friend is always my sixteen year old son.

chillidoggy

Fretwired said:

axisus said:

I'm sure we all get them - A friend request from a beautiful girl in a different country, no info anywhere else on the profile except a couple more pictures of them, and a few plonker 'friends' who have accepted the request.

What's that all about? Surely some kind of scam or information harvesting, but I'm not sure what it would be?

In reality it's a fat bald bloke using his iPad whilst having a shit which a stock photo of a pretty girl .. fix that image in your brain and you can ignore/reject them.

I've been rumbled.

lloyd

I got one not 5 minutes ago, weird as I've not had one for months.

richardhomer

If you want to get more of them, simply 'Like' the Facebook page of Match.com and you'll be inundated.....

chillidoggy

lloyd said:

I got one not 5 minutes ago, weird as I've not had one for months.

Ah, sorry, lloyd.

lloyd

chillidoggy;1118562" said:

lloyd said:

I got one not 5 minutes ago, weird as I've not had one for months.







Ah, sorry, lloyd.

I was feeling lonely, so you cheered me up. Thanks.