Fact Check: Don't fall for '@ highlight' hack on Facebook, you CAN NOT monitor who's visiting your profile
Facebook doesn't let people track who views their profile. It's clearly mentioned in the privacy policy.
Listen to Story
India Today Fact Check
Neither Facebook nor any third-party app allows one to view the people who are checking your profile.
Curious about who stalks your Facebook profile? If social media is to be believed, there’s now a way to monitor who visits or checks your profile.
The hack allegedly is to “type @ in the comments and click the highlights that come from the top so you can see the people that always check your profile.”
India Today found that no method on Facebook allows one to check who visits anyone's profile.
Our Probe
First, we type “@” in the comment box of a viral post. This brings up a list of friends with whom we interact more or less on Facebook. The first name in this list features the person who posted the claim.
Further searches on this topic led us to an official disclaimer by Facebook in the website’s privacy policy. It said, "Facebook doesn't let people track who views their profile. Third-party apps are also unable to provide this functionality. If you come across an app that claims to offer this ability, please report the app."
What happens when we type “@highlight”?
India Today also reached out to Satyam Dhar, a software engineer residing in Canada who worked at Meta previously. Dhar explained, "This feature enables users to highlight any content to their friends, irrespective of who shared it. Typing “@highlight” in the comments of any post will send a notification to the friends of the user who posted this comment. The same thing happens when any user posts comments like @friends or @everyone.”
“Meta's privacy policy does not permit users to check their profile visitors," added Dhar when asked about the viral claim.
Therefore, it is safe to conclude that no hacks can allow a Facebook user to see people who visit their profile.
Please share it on our at 73 7000 7000
You can also send us an email at factcheck@intoday.com