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Facebook’s hidden feature you definitely don’t want to think about

Softonic Editorial Team

Softonic Editorial Team

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If Facebook is still online in 2098, it will be the “world’s biggest virtual graveyard”according to a statistician for the Telegraph newspaper.

There are currently 1.5 billion active Facebook users, the majority of which are unlikely to still be with us by 2098. If there are fewer users by then (let’s say somehing better comes along), it could mean that the number of deceased people on Facebook outnumber those who are still living – it’s quite a sobering yet valid thought.

Facebook’s hidden feature you definitely don’t want to think about

All of this is for one simple reason. When someone dies (and who has a Facebook account),the social network is unable to automatically delete the profile, for obvious reasons. Unless a family member or close friend knows the password to access the account and delete it manually, the profile will continue to exist as normal (some of you may have unfortunately witnessed this already).

So what have Facebook done to avoid this?

Facebook’s Legacy Contact

Facebook allows us to appoint somebody as a “Legacy Contact”, which allows one person (your choice, of course) to post “your last post” and change your profile and cover photos one last time.

Your Legacy Contact CANNOT log into your account, remove or change past posts, nor read or send inbox messages or remove any of your friends.

You can read more about Facebook’s Legacy Contact here.

Softonic Editorial Team

Softonic Editorial Team

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