General Question

stars's avatar

Are facebook profile spy apps a hoax?

Asked by stars (95points) February 6th, 2011 from iPhone

Hi, I’m just wondering if anyone has heard of or had joined a Profile Spy apps? I keep getting requests to join- the claim is that you would be able to know who and how many times one of your friends had looked at your facebook page.
So now I feel weird when I go and looking at pics my friends posts. I don’t want anyone to think I’m spying since that is creepy but I would not even be true!!! I’m not that interested that much in anyone to waste my time actually spying on them!

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7 Answers

jca's avatar

I have gotten 3 things yesterday posted on my wall from friends who did that. They say it’s a hoax, does not work and it posts to all your friends, which I don’t think any of then wanted. Don’t bother. I never use any FB apps.

MrItty's avatar

They are all hoaxes. App creators cannot access any data that Facebook doesn’t release, and Facebook doesn’t release the info of who looked at your profile. Apps are created by regular old people, like you and me. Not by Facebook.

harple's avatar

That one is very much a hoax, and I must say a royal pain in the ass! Avoid at all costs (if for no other reason than to not annoy all your friends who suddenly get spammed with it!)

glenjamin's avatar

It’s complete facebook spam. I researched this awhile back. What @MrItty says is true. What I do to these requests in my newsfeed are hit the ‘X’ and then ‘mark as spam,’ maybe if it happens enough fb will filter these messages in the future.

robmandu's avatar

Occasionally, I’ll see an advertisement message in my News Feed when one of my friends accidentally connects to one of those kinds of apps.

My response is to make a Comment on that item that contains a link to the Facebook FAQ about such hoaxes as well as the message itself. Like so:

http://www.facebook.com/help/?faq=12903

Can I know who’s viewing my profile or how often it’s being viewed?
No, Facebook does not provide the ability to track who is viewing your profile, or parts of your profile, such as your photos. Applications by outside developers cannot provide this functionality, either. Applications that claim to give you this ability will be removed from Facebook for violating policy. You can report applications that provide untrustworthy experiences by clicking the “Report Application” at the bottom of the application’s About page, or by clicking “Report” at the bottom of any canvas page within the application.

stars's avatar

Thanks everyone for all your answers- esp robmandu!!! :)

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