Theresa from New York writes: A friend accepted a Facebook friend request that I “sent,” only I never sent one. Do you know what’s going on?
Although Facebook’s support page specifically says this situation you described can’t possibly happen, there are forums across the Internet filled with people complaining about this very issue. While it’s not entirely clear why this happens, it probably shouldn’t be too surprising that issues like friend requests getting sent or received without any user input occur occasionally.
The world’s most used social network currently has more than a billion people signed up, with Facebook stating that around 750 million people log in daily. With a network that huge – and with frequent changes being rolled out – its no wonder that glitches occur from time to time, especially considering the way Facebook has been changing its “reach” and “sponsored posts” algorithms, affecting who sees what and from whom.
If someone accepted a friend request you didn’t send, be sure to first report the issue at this location, as providing feedback about it can help to ensure the problem gets fixed and it doesn’t occur again.
After reporting the issue, you can simply remove the unwanted person from your friends list. Head over to their Facebook profile, click the “Friends” button near the top of the screen, and then select the “Unfriend” option.
If you don’t want to potentially hurt the person’s feelings by un-friending them, you can instead set it so their posts don’t appear in your feed even though you remain “friends” (of course, they will still be able to see and comment on YOUR posts).
Click the “Friends” icon and then select the “Get Notifications” option. With that option removed, only those posts from that person that Facebook deems “important” (containing key words about life events like “pregnancy,” “divorce,” etc.) will appear in your feed.
If the person’s posts continue to appear in your feed and they are still able to comment on your updates, you can always block them, which prevents all communication of any kind. Just simply choose the “Report/Block” option in the list and follow the prompts.
In the event that friend requests continue to be sent without your knowledge, be sure to change your Facebook password and run a full spyware scan on your computer, as someone else may be accessing your account.
~ Ty Arthur
Have had 3 people accept friend request that I did not send.
3 for me also. Odd.
I think my relationship is over because of this. I had a friend acceptance from a friend of my partner that I Did not add. He thinks that I can’t let him have any friends and is going to leave. He won’t believe me even though it has happened to him it is because it is a friend of his . He thinks I am lying
Just had this happen… Not cool
This just happened to me also…a person I know just accepted a friend request that I never sent….I’d never have sent them one simply because I know them and we are NOT friends. It was frustrating and embarrassing.
A person I know just signed up with Facebook and called me right after to let me know, that she received MY friend request right before she could even edit her privacy settings. a) I never sent her a request and b) I did not even know, that she was on Facebook. She has three other requests from people she does not know. This is more than mysterious – and somehow scary 🙁
I have also gotten 2 friend requests accepted today from people I didn’t request!!! They are friends of people I know, but I never sent a request. NOT COOL!!!
I’ve had tons of people accept “friend” requests that I never sent out…. What the heck is happening? I’m getting Sooooooo ready to just shut the stupid facebook account down….Problem is, you almost need facebook for special promotions, and it’s nice to keep up with real old friends. What to do, what to do?
I have had several notifications that someone accepted my friend request that I never sent. One was from the ex- husband of a dear girlfriend and I never would have in that friend request. I did notify him that it was nothing personal and then deleted him.
A recent one is more complex as it would, I think, very much hurt this person’s feelings and maybe cause ripples within the family… Can you make a general statement in settings somewhere that you are overwhelmed with FB posts and are reluctantly are accepting no more friend requests ? That would be a nice feature because anyone putting in a friend request would get that statement and that it wasn’t personal
Happened to me today! Looks like a fake account. Person had put in a name of a Bible College (or at least part of the name) that I know about and also put that they “liked” a church I used to attend. I have no idea who this person is. Very strange.
This just happened to me and it I got really upset about it. So, I am renting a room out on craigslist and someone emailed me saying that they were interested. They told me their full name so I searched them on facebook just to get an idea of who they were. Well there were too many people with the same name so I couldn’t find the person , however, in that time, I clicked on one persons profile who had the same name as him but it turned out it wasn’t him. Later on that day, I got a notification that the person’s facebook that I was looking at accepted my friend request. I thought to myself, I must have accidentally sent him a friend request while looking at his page. Not true. I searched my activity log under and there was NO friend request logged sent on my behalf, which unnerved me even more. God for bid, what if facebook accidentally sends a friend request to someone who you are enemies with and have great conflict with that could result in legal action or worse? All because of facebook malfunctions? Is it really a malfunction or is it being purposely done by facebook? At this point, it really doesn’t matter because this type of thing can be very dangerous. I deactivated my facebook account. I am through with facebook. I don’t need this sh*t in my life. This malfunction has caused me great distress.
This just recently happened to me and I think it is the mobile app. Unfortunately, the request that I accidently sent happened to be my guy friend’s girlfriend. She may have been in the People you may know section and my finger must have accidently tapped it. Anyway, she sent him a screenshot of it, broke up with him and he texted me and went completely ballistic on me. He said I was a psycho stalker drama queen and now his ex feels threatened by me. I had no clue I friended her and he did not give me a chance to explain. He pretty much told me to get out of his life and leave him and his friends alone. It upsets me that he approached me in this manner, accusing me instead of just nicely asking about it. I think something needs to be done by facebook. They need to have a sound notification or something that gets your attention, so you can see what happens if you do that. I have lost a very good friend now and I don’t think this is salvageable. But I do think he overreacted slightly.
This is intentional from facebook, but they will never admit to it. It centers around advertisements and expansion of facebook. More closely the mighty dollar. I’m done being used as a pawn to further facebook profits. I will delete my account.
I think the person who thinks this issue concerns the mobile app is correct. But I can only speak for myself, when I say that I don’t think this is because anyone is ‘accidentally’ hitting the ‘send friend request’ link.
Two people accepted friend requests from me that I never sent. But I had been looking on their pages a lot. Both people are related to relatives through marriage. And both relatives have had severe health issues. Both of these ‘new’ friends were posting health updates so I was looking on there pretty regularly, even though neither of these people were friends.
I think that if you look at a non friends page too many times, FB sends a friend request, I swear to God.
*Exact* same story as Nicole above. Suddenly two new ‘friend requests accepted’ that I have never (& would never) send. Also using the mobile app….gotta remember to not check someone’s page too many times then!!! Even if it is for non stalking purposes!!
Happened to me today and I can tell you, because of the circumstances, that there is no way that I sent a friend request, even accidentally. Maybe Facebook should have a double check on these requests eg sending your requests to a requests to a private log on your page and requiring you to confirm the request from there. It shouldn’t really be possible to accidentally send a friend request with one click.
Happened to me today and I can tell you, because of the circumstances, that there is no way that I sent a friend request, even accidentally. Maybe Facebook should have a double check on these requests eg sending them to a requests section in a private log on your page and requiring you to confirm the request from there. It shouldn’t really be possible to accidentally send a friend request with one click, you might want to take it back with a litle thought.
It just happened to me on my laptop to someone I have never heard of. I opened facebook and there was nothing by means of a friend notificaion, then I went to make coffee and when I came back i had a notification that someone I don’t know (1 mutual friend) accepted my friend request. I usually accept most requests but i NEVER send requests even to people I know.
Every week I get a notification that someone accepted my friend request.
These are the people I never send the request.
All these people just joined facebook. and request is sent to people who is joining new on fb.
After receiving a friend request from somebody who never sent it I checked my own account and found 3 friend requests which I NEVER sent. That’s too much for sheer coincidence. I want my privacy protected!!!
A creature just joined facebook and has accepted a request which i never sent! Why will i send a friend request to someone who i dnt know…moreover,a person who joined facebook not long ago.. Merely disgusting! This scares me a lil’ #buLLsh*t
I constantly have to explane to my Gf that I did not send some of the requests whom excepted it. Also It just sucks.
Ruhan, I want you to go into your Facebook account and check out how many apps you have actually installed. You know all those quizzes and things folks take? Many of them install apps that require permissions. These could be the culprits behind sending these requests. Also, do you have a security program than also checks your social media feeds as well?
I,too, have received friend requests never sent to me by that person. Also, people have received requests which I have never sent. Please correct this in your system. It is very embarrasing & and uncomfortsble
This has happened 3 times to me i didn’t even add the person I know I didn’t cause I never went on Facebook that day
I received a notice that someone accepted a friend request but I never sent one to this person.
It is unfortunate because I know her from years ago but would not have friended her. I
I do not know how this happens but I don’t like it.
This problem needs to be fixed.
This has happened to me twice. I’ve gotten notifications saying these people accepted my friend request that I didn’t send. I don’t even know either of these people and don’t know how they could have received friend requests from me without me knowing. I wish Facebook would fix this problem because it’s ridiculous and dangerous.
This has happened to me four times now ! I have gotten notifications that my friend request has been accepted, when I never sent a request. This is upsetting, embarrassing, and just plain ridiculous ! Please fix this bug !
I did not send a friend request and it showed that I did. His has happened before and it’s very frustrating.
Facebook have sent several friend requests to people I don’t no last to someone in Canada .to me there breaching there terms of use and putting the security of my account at risk .not only is it wrong surely its illegal
This is happening to me at least twice a week. It started about two months ago. I’m really getting tired of having to get on Facebook just to unfriendly people from across the country I’ve never met or even heard of.
This is happening daily now. NOT impressed. Awkward when someone from 30 years ago “sends” a friend request and hasn’t used fb since 2012. What’s with THAT??
Happened to my mom sent out friend request to 40 different people from other parts of the world.
I got a message from someone asking if they knew me because I sent them a friend request. I did not and told them so, they then sent me a screen shot of “my request”. This is creepy and a violation of the fb user agreement, so it needs to stop ASAP. I never add anybody I don’t know!
This happened to me last night when I was out and my phone was left on charge very embarrassing as one of the requests was to a young girl I am 65 this could have caused me a great deal of trouble lucky enough Iknow the family
I joined Facebook in August and within a couple of days my friend contacted me to say he just received my friend request, I told him I didn’t send a friend request. He thought I was lying and he proceed to confirming it. Till date he doesn’t believe I didn’t send it. This is very frustrating annoying and very awkward. I wish I could give Facebook a piece of my mind.
Other similar incidents also occurred several times.
This has happened to me too, it has caused no end of trouble. I wish the system could be tightened up to stop this. My friend request does not even show the person concerned, but I have had contact from a very angry person, who never the less got the unwanted invitation.
At least twice in the past several months, I have had people accept ‘Friend’ requests that I never sent. And I suspect I am getting requests from people who may not know their account is doing that. Since, so far anyway, we all know each other (friends of friends, and it’s also a school reunion site), there isn’t much we can do. But it is now obvious that it does happen, and it’s even more obvious that Facebook, by their abject silence on the matter also knows it’s happening and either can’t, or won’t do anything about it. Especially since they are constantly encouraging members to increase their friend size. If you won’t do it yourself, they’ll just help you along. Something is going on, and it’s not pleasant…or honest
I got a notice that my friend request was accepted. I live in California and this “friend” lives in Finland! I don’t know the person and didn’t send the request. What is up on this and how do I stop it from happening again?
I have never been on face book and I get notifications from personal friends that didn’t send the notification.(people I have never emailed or contacted) I feel I’m being stalked and it’s very creepy. This has stopped me from joining face book altogether. Why and how are they stalking me?
It’s really creepy and silly to find a notification from my friend’s brother that he accepted my friend request as I don’t know him and it was my first time to see his account. I am really embarrassed and I deactivated my account because I am really don’t know what should I telling her!!!!
I received 2 unsolicited “friend” acceptances today. The first from my Aunty and the second from my sister in laws brother. Yes, I know both of these people personally, however, I DID NOT request them to be friends. How can someone who is friends with my “actual” friends, that is my mother and sister in law accept a friend request when I did not invite them. Whilst I know these people in real life, how can they become my “virtual friends” without my request?
Obviously from the volume of complaints, this is a Facebook issue , not something people are doing by mistake. Why is Facebook not addressing this concern ?
i dont like facebook.. instagram
Happened to me couple of times, also getting requests from people I barely know, awkward. Something to do with looking at profiles or a FB search.
It just happened to me, fortunately it was to a co-worker. I never sent him a friend request, we aren’t that close so I never thought to even try. To my surprise I got a notification that he accepted my friend request that I never sent!
I have also had the same problem with an ex and apparently also invited her to join Facebook
This has caused me a lot of problems
Just received a notice that someone with 5000 friends has accepted a friend request I’ve never sent. We do not have any mutual friends and the name is not similar to any of my searches which eliminates the possibility of an accidental request.
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My boyfriend has an account that we cannot delete. He does not know his username or password. He joined FB while signing up to play a game and never even realized he joined. Move forward 2 years and he now has 1 friend. This friend is someone out of the country and someone he had met 20 – 30 years ago. This person is not in any of his contacts as he never had email 20 – 30 years ago. We are annoyed and have no idea how this happened. We only know it happened because my daughter searched him on FB and his account shows up and shows he has 1 friend. FB destroys lives. I question his honesty. What can we do to find out how this happened?
Same thing just happened to me but we have some mutual friends. I thought i must be loosing my mind or i was sending out requests in my sleep
This has happened to me a few times. It is when I’ve been looking through the “people you may know” list I may visit their page to see who it is, but never sent the request to be friends. So embarradssung!
This situation has just lost me a friend, when it seemed that I requested her ex, but I didn’t and wouldn’t! It’s happened to someone else I know too.
me too, only mine is sending out about 10 friend requests a day, then even more while I’m sleeping ,today a lady wanted to know how I knew her husband? but I don’t know him, and her either, and I didn’t send them a friend request, but my computer did, I tried to explain ,but the more I explained, the worst it sounded ,so I just shut up I guess