Sep

2011

1:16pm, EDT

How to find out who unfriended you on Facebook

By Rosa Golijan

We've shown you how to try Facebook's new profile page — also known as the "Timeline" — right now, but did you know that it's more than just a pretty design? It can be used to find out exactly which of your friends quietly unfriended you at some point.

This clever trick was discovered by the folks at Buzzfeed (who we hear skipped work to spend the whole day playing around with Timelines) and it's pretty simple.

All you have to do after enabling Timeline on your Facebook account is pick a random year and scroll down until you find a "Friends" box.

Facebook

Once you've found one of those boxes, click on the "Made [some number] New Friends" text.

You'll see a little pop-up with a list of the friends you made at that particular point in time. If you're still friends with a person, the button next to his or her name will say "Friends." But if you're not? Then the button will say "Add Friend" instead.

Busted!

Facebook

Of course it's worth noting that the people who have an "Add Friend" button might not have unfriended you — instead they might've been the victims of your friend list purge.

Related stories:

Want more tech news, silly puns, or amusing links? You'll get plenty of all three if you keep up with Rosa Golijan, the writer of this post, by following her on Twitter, subscribing to her Facebook posts, or circling her on Google+.

Browse: featured, facebook, social-media, social-networking

Jump to discussion page: 1 2

Blake-2644321

Just another useless tip for the dramatic, the FB stalkers, and the unlawful communicators.

2 votes

#29 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 2:08 PM EDT

EmilyinIowa

Why don't people just set "friends" with annoying status updates to "ignore" like the rest of us...

1 vote

#30 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 2:19 PM EDT

JuanPerez-2021672

Useless Social Networking..

1 vote

#31 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 2:19 PM EDT

UnitedStates1776

FB is the biggest time-waster in the world !!

2 votes

#32 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 2:33 PM EDT

Lanny Gene Wood

I'm satisfied with the traditional Facebook profile and don't want or need to add to it. If it's not broken, don't try to fix it. Several of my friends are saying they're going to go to Google + and scrap Facebook. So.... Thank you.

3 votes

#33 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 2:54 PM EDT

Slimeslayer

only problem with this is that the people listed may have been"unfriended" by me... not necessarily the other way around

#34 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 4:01 PM EDT

Frank1977

I deleted my account several months ago after admitting to myself that I really didn't give a @!$%# about my 200+ so-called friends.

3 votes

#35 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 4:09 PM EDT

MrAndrewT

Gotta love the FB haters who whine about time wasted and are caught writing lame comments on a page that 7 people will read. Good thing Alexander Graham Bell ignored these Philistines.

#36 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 4:10 PM EDT

AceTurner1982

I know that it's the internet, and nothing is ever REALLY private.... but I'm pretty tired of "big brother, Facebook" invading what little privacy they pretend we have. Time to de-activate this account and start using Google+

1 vote

#37 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 4:34 PM EDT

AceTurner1982

#38 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 4:34 PM EDT

RD13

Frank1977, I did the same. In my case, I also told all my extended family members that I was closing the account, and that they should not think that I fell off the end of the Earth. They can still call me if I am that important to them.

As for my 50 or so so-called "friends," unfriending them is something that I did as casually as I "friended" them. It meant nothing either way because these "friends" are hardly what the word implies. A friend is someone who is willing to go out of his way to help you when you need it, and the "friends" I made on Facebook were simply narcissists.

So, so long Facebook and the synthetic relationships that it offers. Glad to see it gone.

2 votes

#39 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 4:34 PM EDT

Badeck

#40 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 4:35 PM EDT

Haggard Old Man

Perhaps Mark should add new categories - "acquaintances" & BFFs, to distinguish your Internet pals from your REAL ones!

1 vote

#41 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 4:40 PM EDT

Bellatrix Jagaroth

Facebook destroys lives, businesses and livelihoods. "Where did you go? Your SIM misses you." I had a friend who wanted to start a business with me. She couldn't fathom why I had to include the 10K productivity loss in the business plan. She figures Farmville is advertising.

Can't wait til FB goes the way of MySpace.

1 vote

#42 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 5:21 PM EDT

reaj

Duh, look at your friend list, if someone isn't there, they "unfriended" you. Unless you're a friend collector and have like a bazillion "friends" on your page then why would you even care?

2 votes

#43 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 5:34 PM EDT

Kai.

WHO CARES if someone unfriended you? What a stupid article. Oh, and btw, you may delete your Facebook account, but it never really goes away. You sign back in and it's there just like you never left. Now that's creepy!

2 votes

#44 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 6:31 PM EDT

RD13

Kai, you are right. Facebook never deletes the data, so if they get into the business of seriously selling information about account holders, even if you do leave, your information is not safe.

What the country needs is a law that would make one's personal information the property of the person who submits it, not the company that warehouses it. Such a law should say that when people submit their information to a warehouser like Facebook, Google, or any other U.S. entity, they are granting a license to use the information in specific ways. It should also say that the license may be withdrawn by the submitter or rescinded by the warehouser, and in such cases the warehouser has the obligation to destroy the data, certify its destruction, and to provide a written acknowledgement to the submiitter of it having been done. That would make the warehouser liable for breach of contract and information theft if it later made use of the information.

Such a law would be very much in keeping with Canadian law, and it would be a real game changer for Internet privacy abusers because it would provide real teeth for enforcement.

2 votes

#44.1 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 6:40 PM EDT

mnweir

If you un-friend someone so what. Maybe you are just bored with their at home business self-promotion that you really don't give a damn about anyway. Four times a day reading about colon cleansing, facial hair removal, skin therapy and butt pimples are not interesting to EVERYONE !!! SEND THAT STUFF TO A SELECT FEW NOT EVERYONE...PLEASE.

1 vote

#45 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 6:45 PM EDT

Meshell-4166093

Wish I never tried it! I have this need for everyone to like me. Turns out everyone does not! Ignorance really is bliss.

#46 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 6:47 PM EDT

SebastpolBob

Since we all know that Facebook has no ethics, why don't we ask them to give us a category for "Who is spying on you (gov't agencies, advertisers, etc.)". At least we'd be able to level the playing field a bit. If these groups can legally look at our data, we should have the right to know who's looking at us.

#47 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 7:00 PM EDT

DEN-1189913

Oh sure that would be nice but never gonna happen. We live a world where there isn't one big brother watching over us but dozens.

#48 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 7:24 PM EDT

Ryan-1773892

Either this was fixed or it does NOT work. I checked my 2010 friends and there are no Add Friends button in the entire list, and I know of a few people who HAVE unfriended me since then.

Nice try whoever wrote this.

#49 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 7:58 PM EDT

Jim-883724

Really, who cares about who doesn't want to be their friend?

#50 - Fri Sep 23, 2011 8:15 PM EDT

ToyaEvonne

I'm pretty sure if I havent noticed by now that you're not on my friends list anymore, then you werent that important to begin with. and im certainly not gonna stalk through past friends lists to figure out whos there or not. its really not that serious.