16 Comments »I think I’m way behind on this but today when searching for Facebook’s advanced search feature, I ended up empty handed. The new search page only displays search by name, school and company. Previously Facebook enabled users to use the advanced search utility to find people by practically all areas of a user’s profile. Now there appears to be no more advanced search feature. I searched the web and couldn’t find any reference to the removal but this is significant.
First, this emphasizes Facebook’s commitment to making the site a social utility to browse among your own friends. There is also no longer a link to browse for users within the new design. While you can access browse by going to the following page, it doesn’t appear to be accessible via any other method. There’s another component of the missing advanced search story which is a little more sinister. It appears that someone has successfully attempted to capitalize on advanced search gone missing.
An application called “Advanced Search” claims to enable users to search through over 80 million users on Facebook. How do they let you do that? Well in the past month alone close to 50,000 people have accessed this application. When you visit the app, it automatically populates a bunch of form fields with you name, gender, birthday, schools you’ve attended, companies you’ve worked at and more. It looks just like Facebook’s standard advanced search which misleads users into submitting their information.
This application would be extremely useful for any of the ad networks that wish to use profile data to target users. The other funny thing about this application? It doesn’t appear to actually provide any advanced search functionality. Instead it simply collects data. When you view the “advanced search application” it states “Welcome to Advanced Search for Facebook - Before you start searching, please check, update and store your details so that other people can search for you.”
It then prompts users to enter there info. If you don’t enter anything, it doesn’t display the search. Yikes! I’ve tried searching for more information on this application which has been popular since last October and I couldn’t find anything. Have you been able to find Facebook’s advanced feature? Have you tried this misleading application? Do you think it should be shut down?
It’s still there under Profile Search:
http://www.new.facebook.com/s.php?init=q&sf=r&k=200000010&n=-1&q=search
If you search for someone (or even just type a single letter) in the top-right search box, there will be a “profile search” link next to the search box on the next page.
It’s still very much there — ditto to what was said by Garret.
link here: http://www.new.facebook.com/advanced.php
Thanks for the link! Where did ou find that?
Thanks! I have been searching for advanced search. I actually accidently found it yesterday, but today can’t figure out how I did that
It's still there, just not linked…..
http://www.new.facebook.com/advanced.php
there is no “profile search” when I follow these instructions
I checked this and it only allows you to search within your friends list, you can use it to search for new friends.
sorry typo, you CANNOT use it to search for new friends
Alright how the heck do you search by interests, such as music, now?
Well I remember you used to be able to also search for people’s “interested in:” as well in the advanced search. I used to just randomly click “Gender: Male” and “Interested in: Men” just to see who comes up lol
… Can’t do THAT anymore..
I agree with Noel.. it upsets me
I used to be able to search facebook for people with common interests, and by doing so ended up meeting all of my closest friends. I’m no in a new city and would like to do the same, but seem to be SOL. Why would they remove such a powerful feature?
I was in a class of ‘99 in Nu-West Secondary in NewLands West, and I will like to organize a 10th year reunion with all my classmates. If anyone who was in the class of ‘99 and interested in this idea, kindly inform me so that we can plan this together. There is nothing so pleasant like seeing your old friends and classmates after 10 years, and poeple, remember this is a once in a lifeftime event, so please make this happen. e-mail me on tmgoza@dla.gov.za or 27797087012@vodamail.co.za
I hate this too. I do see that Profile Search is still around, but why is it so hard to access? And I agree with Noel- I used to do that too and now I can’t. Why did they do that? Stupid Facebook.
Hi, Could someone let me know if its still possible to filter all my friends from a particular country. Im going to Indonesia soon and want to let them know though I dont want to have to go through all my friends to find them as it will take ages.. Thanks!!!