Facebook Changed Everyone’s Email to @Facebook.com; Here’s How to Fix It

[IainB]

Just a heads-up, courtesy of Lifehacker:
Facebook Changed Everyone’s Email to @Facebook.com; Here’s How to Fix It

Beats me why Facebook would behave like this.

[daddydave]

My email address has been visible to Only Me since I've had a Facebook account, and that hasn't changed. This new dummy email address is visible to Friends. I wonder which one Facebook apps have access to -- could this be a spam prevention measure?

[Jibz]

If their idea of spam prevention is silently adding an e-mail address that is visible to more people than your own address, then they are almost as bad as facebook ... oh wait

[IainB]

I made my email addresses private - "Only me" and "Hidden from timeline".

[PhilB66]

Beats me why Facebook would behave like this.

-IainB (June 25, 2012, 09:05 PM)

Now FB can claim that its email service is a great success. Proof? Hundreds of millions of users.   

[app103]

It doesn't matter if you hide the email address, it still exists. And if you have one of those custom facebook URL's, it is easy to guess the email address. It's the name in your URL @facebook.com.

Before the email address was optional, now it is not. You have it whether you want it or not, plan to use it or not, hide it or not. And you don't get to choose one that is different than the name you already use for facbook's custom URL.

And it will be so easy for the spammers to figure it out, even if you remove it from your profile.

If you have ever made a comment on a company's fan page, ever liked something popular, friended anyone else that has, they will easily find you to spam you.

Just imagine the notifications for every spam message, mixed in with the ones for private messages from friends and family.

This is going to be a disaster for Facebook with a lot of people closing their accounts and going elsewhere. Just a matter of time, now.

[justice]

too cynical? "Yes we respect your privacy settings and for your convenience here is a overarching layer to bypass it."

[Jibz]

I would imagine it is more of a way to get tons of e-mail from the less tech-savvy users routed through their service, so they can gather up even more information about them.

[IainB]

This is going to be a disaster for Facebook with a lot of people closing their accounts and going elsewhere. Just a matter of time, now.

-app103 (June 26, 2012, 01:51 AM)

Yes, you could well be proven right.
This sort of apparently ad hoc unilateral controlling action wouldn't bode well for anyone, I reckon.
Given their past performance, how could you take anything but a dim view of this?
It would seem to be pretty desperate to risk shooting yourself in the foot like this.

[Stoic Joker]

They're just trying to cull out the last of the few people there left with an ounce of common sense so the rest can be quietly volunteeded (via EULA update) to participate in testing of their new Soylent Green line of products.

[mouser]

Not that I care about facebook, but everyone seems to be talking about this change of emails and I still don't get what it means.. What does it mean they they changed your email to @facebook?  I guess I just don't know how the emails are used.. What are the ramifications of that? How does it affect you?  Can someone explain how these emails are used and what it matters what email facebook shows(?) uses(?)

[fenixproductions]

Not that I care about facebook, but everyone seems to be talking about this change of emails and I still don't get what it means.. What does it mean they they changed your email to @facebook?  I guess I just don't know how the emails are used.. What are the ramifications of that? How does it affect you?  Can someone explain how these emails are used and what it matters what email facebook shows(?) uses(?)

-mouser (June 26, 2012, 11:33 AM)

Dunno about that but when I had tried to send an email from my company address to [email protected], after few hours I've got server reply saying something like:

Your message was not delivered due to user's account privacy settings.

[wraith808]

Do you have to check it?  I mean the e-mail account.  As long as they don't forward to my personal account, I don't care.  It will just take up space on their servers.

[rgdot]

This is really nothing in my opinion, no effect on anybody as far as I can tell. It's probably another step in their messaging system - ie facebook want everything to be facebook, even the part after @

[wraith808]

This is really nothing in my opinion, no effect on anybody as far as I can tell. It's probably another step in their messaging system - ie facebook want everything to be facebook, even the part after @

-rgdot (June 26, 2012, 01:07 PM)

Well, I believe it can be something to certain people.  If you actually publish your e-mail address and use it as a form of contact, then this does affect you.  Especially if it's a business or your primary link to family/friends.

[rgdot]

At least in my case I can toggle visibility of @facebook and my email

[jgpaiva]

after few hours I've got server reply saying something like:

Your message was not delivered due to user's account privacy settings.

-fenixproductions (June 26, 2012, 12:59 PM)

Curiosity: do your privacy settings allow people who are not your friends to send you personal messages in facebook? I suspect not

From what I understand, this is just them giving the messaging system a broader use, by fully replacing it with something similar to email. As Jibz said, just an attempt to get more data (instead of giving it to google? ):

I would imagine it is more of a way to get tons of e-mail from the less tech-savvy users routed through their service, so they can gather up even more information about them.

-Jibz (June 26, 2012, 04:28 AM)

[wraith808]

At least in my case I can toggle visibility of @facebook and my email
 (see attachment in previous post)

-rgdot (June 26, 2012, 01:18 PM)

I don't think the largest issue is the ability to toggle visibility, but that facebook decided without consent to make it visible by default.

[rgdot]

I don't disagree, just pointing it out. Visible by default, no matter what it is, is modus operandi @ facebook and everybody should treat it that way too. Without external (politicians, users and even G+) pressure 99.9% the current privacy settings wouldn't even exist.

[fenixproductions]

after few hours I've got server reply saying something like:

Your message was not delivered due to user's account privacy settings.

-fenixproductions (June 26, 2012, 12:59 PM)

Curiosity: do your privacy settings allow people who are not your friends to send you personal messages in facebook? I suspect not

-jgpaiva (June 26, 2012, 01:25 PM)

You're right.

[tomos]

Seems there's at least 162 people with my name so I dont think this new email address will be a problem. Also they've left my original address as my main email, so I presume that is what apps will get (unfortunately).

[rgdot]

They should have changed all to @zuckerberg.com

 

[jgpaiva]

At least in my case I can toggle visibility of @facebook and my email
 (see attachment in previous post)

-rgdot (June 26, 2012, 01:18 PM)

I don't think the largest issue is the ability to toggle visibility, but that facebook decided without consent to make it visible by default.

-wraith808 (June 26, 2012, 02:10 PM)

I still haven't understood why this is a problem. If you allowed messages from unknown people, the "send a message" button was there before and it accomplished the same objective. If you did not allow them (and still don't), as fenixproductions mentioned, emails from unknown sources get refused (much in the same way messages from unknown sources would).
If they made the personal emails available (the ones not from facebook), I would understand the problem, this way, I really don't.

[wraith808]

At least in my case I can toggle visibility of @facebook and my email
 (see attachment in previous post)

-rgdot (June 26, 2012, 01:18 PM)

I don't think the largest issue is the ability to toggle visibility, but that facebook decided without consent to make it visible by default.

-wraith808 (June 26, 2012, 02:10 PM)

I still haven't understood why this is a problem. If you allowed messages from unknown people, the "send a message" button was there before and it accomplished the same objective. If you did not allow them (and still don't), as fenixproductions mentioned, emails from unknown sources get refused (much in the same way messages from unknown sources would).
If they made the personal emails available (the ones not from facebook), I would understand the problem, this way, I really don't.

-jgpaiva (June 26, 2012, 06:31 PM)

You're looking at it purely from the intent of privacy concerns and personal uses.  Facebook, for better or worse, is used by non-businesses.  And some of them post their contact information to get in contact with them off of facebook.  If all of a sudden, business correspondence is going to facebook messaging rather than their e-mail address... that's a concern, at least as far as I see.

The other concern (even from a personal use) is transparency of action.  When google opted people in to buzz, did it really do anything terribly bad?  It was just that people got opted into a service that they didn't opt into.  Same thing goes here.

[IainB]

They're just trying to cull out the last of the few people there left with an ounce of common sense so the rest can be quietly volunteeded (via EULA update) to participate in testing of their new Soylent Green line of products.

-Stoic Joker (June 26, 2012, 11:26 AM)

Har-de-har-har. Very droll.