An analysis of facebook's graph search

Abstract

With over a billion active users monthly Facebook is one of the biggest social media sites in the world. Facebook encourages friends and people with similar interests to share information such as messages, pictures, videos, website links, and other digital media. With the large number of users active on Facebook, an upgrade to Facebook’s searching capability was made through the launch of graph search. Graph search is a powerful search feature which allows users to search Facebook using queries phrased in simple English. When a query is executed, the results from the search can reveal personal information of friends as well as strangers. This availability of personal information to strangers is a cyber security threat to citizens. Cyber criminals can use the graph search feature for malicious and illegal intent. This paper presents an analysis of graph search on Facebook. The purpose of the study is to highlight the amount and type of personal information that is accessible through Facebook’s graph search. This is done through the design and execution of graph queries on two separate Facebook profiles. An analysis of the results is presented, together with possible negative consequences, and guidance as to best practices to follow in order to minimise the cyber security threats imposed by Facebook’s graph search.