Uninvited facebook friend

I set up a facebook page last year to offer support to those who suffer from a particular condition. I very stupidly used my own picture. I was inundated with friends requests from 5 star US Army generals, hospital surgeons, Pastors and other men of high wealth. I was astounded. I decided to play along with a few of them and sure enough within a few messages they all had something in common - they all loved me, wanted to meet me, but needed me to pay for the airfare so they could come to the UK to meet me. I suggested to one who said he was based in New York that I could fly out to meet him there and have a lovely break there as I'd never been there before. Amazingly there were a thousand reasons why this was not possible. I also got downright xxx rated messages detailing in no uncertain terms what the writer would like to do with me!!! I closed the account down as I couldn't be bothered with the hassle. Hubby laughed his head off and said he never imagined he was married to a woman who was in such high demand. I said "Just you remember that". We've laughed so much about it.

jalima Sorry, i had a look too, fb have obviously changed it in their 'busybody' way!

There are security settings on Facebook to limit who can see your posts.

If you have any friends in common with anyone else, they will bve getting the procession of "People you may know" too. Some of your friends may have a very wide circle of people they hardly know themselves, if your circles overlap you are visible to their friends, whoever they might be.

Also if you post anything on Facebook, your name appears on it and a click on that goes to your home page.

I think some "US generals" just trawl Facebook for likely posts, click on the name of the poster to go to their home page, then send a friendship request to anyone who takes their eye. If even one in a hundred responds, they have one person to keep up a correspondence with.

Looks like many of us have had these friend requests from so called American generals.
I just delete them but often wonder how they found my profile without knowing my name.

People You May Know... of course I don't know any of them and they are easily deleted, then immediately another list appears. It could be a full time job? But then there is a separate list of Notifications, and I don't know them either. These I can not delete for some weird reason. I don't know how to get rid of those.
I don't really trust FB and think I may come off it. Not my thing really.

I have accidentally sent friendship requests to people when their names have come up as 'people I might know' and I've meant to delete them. I simply send a message to say it's been sent in error so could they please delete me and wish them well. Everybody happy and no harm done,

I just had a look and there were only two choices:
Who can send you friend requests?
Everyone or Friends of friends

No choice of none at all

Thanks Lona, I will try to find none at all as I get loads of requests from 'friends of friends' and delete them all (or at least I think I do).

I seem to have missed out somewhere along the line, no American gentlemen seem at all interested in me.
Although a friend got stuck in Romania recently, having had all his money stolen and needed money for hospital treatment and to get home again.

As far as I can remember, if you go through your privacy settings there is a choice to allow friend requests from 'friends of friends' or none at all. So you don't get all the scammers and generals. I've never had any on my account.

Social media NOUN
[treated as singular or plural] Websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking. (Oxford Living Dictionaries)

Yep, that seems to cover us.

This is still social media Cardiffjaguar we don't know each other yet we are talking often about private problems .... what do you think Internet forums are ?

I get one friend request a month from American gentlemen, yes they do look like military men and although have different names sometimes are strangely similar.

kittylester: you do not appear to know the difference between a forum, such as this is, and social media such as FB, twitter, instagram, tumblr, whatsapp and more. But do not try any of them just to find out.

Elegran didn't receive a friend request, she received confirmation of a request she hadn't sent, which could be a sign of her account having been hacked. It's what happened to my account (see my post upthread)

I did the same - got an acceptance of friendship from a spanish bloke - who added 'Do I KNow you?' I replied 'No I must have clicked something by mistake!' He said 'Ah I thought so,' and the 'friendship' was terminated. He was a friend of my niece who lives in Spain I realised later. I think this often happens when we (incompetent?) oldies are operating facebook.
I have no worries about it - my privacy settings are tight and all my friends are known to me. Its a good way of keeping in touch with the extended family apart from anything else.
Never been approached by good looking American officers!

Hi, I think I had this happen a few years ago-don't think you can really resolve it-just delete the person in question. I was also added to a couple of FB groups unbeknown to me and had to delete that. It's easy for people to criticise FB but I think it can be great
as long as you realise that it may not be as secure as you'd hope-and be mindful of what you post. I've found relatives thanks to FB and as self employed, also acquired work through it. I wouldn't let it put you off if you enjoy it.

I have often on a very rare occasion nodded off while checking GN last thing at night. Occasionally when I come to I find I've clicked on Private message or Report, and the page is open patiently waiting for my words of wisdom. So if anyone has received a PM full of gobbledegook from me - probably on the lines of a few rows of zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz - please accept my apologies!

I get these requests always from American forces men ! I delete them , they are scams usually from the far east and will eventually come up with some sob story and ask you for money . Any one who falls for this must have a screw loose !

I've accidentally sent a friends request when scrolling through FB. It's easily done,

kitty Sometimes the only way to read reviews of a company is to go on FB. If you're not signed up I think you can only access limited info. My local radio station often puts interesting stuff on FB.

I'm confused about why one would be on fb and have no friends. I am aware that I am a bear of little brain.

I have no FB friends ...I delete all requests ..... did read somewhere where a woman befriended an 'American air force pilot' who messaged her so many times she fell for his 'charm' then started asking her for money so he could buy himself out of the air force and come to live with her ......sadly in the newspaper the report was that she DID send him money ...I don't think any of us are that daft ....so delete it or refuse request !

So, what are people who think social media is wrong, doing posting here?

I thought that two friend requests I got from friends of DD3 must have been fb generated, so ignored them. They asked her if I didn't like them. Oops!