Andrew Orr, MacObserver:
We’ve shared plenty of tips on how to delete Facebook, remove third-party apps, control privacy settings, and delete bulk content. But what if you want to go even further? It turns out we can, and we can block Facebook completely by editing the hosts file.
In this guide we’ll be adding Facebook-owned domains to the hosts file, which will block them from our system. This is important because even if you deleted your Facebook account, Facebook can still track you around the web like Google does via its advertising platform.
This whole Facebook thing really has me torn. Personally, I was never a fan, at best a reluctant user. But I do get the benefit of reconnecting with old friends, that sort of thing.
But what I really hate is how deeply Facebook has embedded itself into the details of people’s personal data. So much so, that it has become almost impossible for the average person to extricate themselves from Facebook’s clutches.
Read the linked article, which walks you through one way of eliminating Facebook from your Mac. I’m not recommending this path. I don’t like any solution that has you disable a critical part of your Mac’s security infrastructure (in this case SIP). And, as is pointed out for iOS, and as Kirk McElhearn points out is possible for the Mac as well, you can use an ad blocker to achieve a similar end.
I take no fault with Andrew’s article. I’m using it as an example to point out how inexorably tied we’ve all become to Facebook.
What I’d like is a switch that let me remove myself from Facebook’s databases entirely, a do-not-track setting that Facebook would be required to respect. Fat chance of that happening.
I’m torn too. I belong to several fb groups where I get some useful information. And since the vast majority of fb users sign up with their own names, the conversations tend to be more civil and less trolling than on social media forums where anonymity is the norm. Still I hate the way they exploit the user. Maybe I need to give Linkedin some attention.
I started backing off Facebook five or six years ago, as I realized it was taking too much of my time. Last year I finally severed the last ties, cutting off all email notifications. I haven’t removed my account: would require too much explaining. But I only check it once in a blue moon to find something I’ve been already told is there.
I see quite a few posts and comments around about how useful Facebook is in keeping up with friends and family and sharing news and photos and the like. Thing is, you could do that with Facebook a decade ago. Everything since then is above and beyond and unnecessary to that goal.
Yeah, I’ve been editing the hosts file for ages. It won’t unlock in TextEdit but it will unlock in terminal with sudo, or in BBEdit with authentication. All it needs is authentication, you do not need to disable SIP. But you do need to flush the DNS cache after editing.
I use Dan Pollock’s exhaustive hosts blacklist at
http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/
There’s nothing to be torn about. Enter as little data as possible. Don’t like companies you don’t give a shit about following. Assume everything you enter or click will be sold to your nemesis. If you don’t have a nemesis, don’t worry: Facebook will figure out who they are and sell it to them. It’s all part of the service.
It seems the Mac Observer author wasn’t aware you could do this without disabling SIP. Skip to page 3, with simple instructions to edit the hosts file without disabling SIP, and without requiring two reboots.
You should seriously get Two email accounts! Use on for your personal email and one for online stores and such!
Except we can’t use the Facebook from a decade ago. We have the choice of using this one or not.
I turned off the Platform stuff (FB signup, apps) and, downloading my history, I just don’t see anything I care about being public there.
I also think people in general need to pull their heads out. If we’re not paying Facebook then ads and data mining are their revenue. It’s incredibly annoying how people want everything for free but don’t get this.
PS: even the FB from a decade ago was on this trajectory. It costs money to run a social network at scale. VCs will fund that for awhile but they want a return and so far people only have found 2 sources of revenue – the person getting the value pays (i.e. we pay to be able to use FB) or their attention is sold which means that you create an internal ad network and target people while on the network and/or sell aggregate data.
Welcome to Hotel California -is what I said to my rellies 10 years ago when I joined.