For me, today was a busy day. After quite a bit of work, I was finally able to #deletefacebook. I have several reasons for this, and I’m going to try to explain my decision a little bit down below.
First of all, I think Facebook has far too much control over my data. Even though I rarely used the Facebook site itself, I did often use my Facebook account. To sign in to other websites, that is. After hearing about so many scandals recently, I decided I do not want to be a user of this social medium any longer.
Of course, Facebook itself is not the only problem. Facebook also owns Instagram (which I rarely if ever used) and WhatsApp (a messaging service which I really do not like to use, but which I’m pretty much forced to use because everyone else does so; that includes pretty much every student at university).
When I checked this morning, I found out I had used my Facebook account at approximately 200 other sites!
Deleting my Facebook account proved to be quite tough. When I checked this morning, I found out I had used my Facebook account at approximately 200 other sites! So, I started the cumbersome process of deleting many of these accounts, while making sure I had an alternative way to access the others. This took me several hours of work. It also meant giving up on a few accounts, especially on my Spotify account (as Spotify does not allow you to unlink your Facebook account if your Spotify account was created using your Facebook account).
In the end, all of this hard work paid off. I also found that I signed up for quite a lot of sites which I actually rarely use, and I deleted accounts on many of such sites. I have not deleted my Facebook account just yet, as I’m still waiting for Facebook to make a data download available for me, but after that I will press the (delete my account) button.
And what will happen to my WhatsApp account? I’m not sure yet, but I might actually delete it pretty soon. If I choose to do so, which might occur pretty soon, I will still be available on Telegram, Signal or via email or SMS. And of course, I will let those who know me know in that case.