Here’s Why Facebook Might Have Labeled You As Dead Today
Facebook (and America in general, really) has been a kind of scary place since Tuesday night’s election results were announced (speaking of which, here’s how to deal if you see or experience any acts of post-election hate). Things got extra frightening, however, when some users logged on to Facebook today to find that they and loved ones had been officially marked as… dead?
Posting a disclaimer at the top of many users’ pages (make that a reported two million — eek!), Facebook suggested that people were, in fact, suddenly deceased. “Remembering [fill-in-name here],” the message read. “We hope people who love [name] will find comfort in the things others share to remember and celebrate [his/her] life.”
RT if you dead on Facebook
— Vann R. Newkirk II (@fivefifths) November 11, 2016
Rumors swirled about the reason for the strange occurrence, attributing it to everything from hackers targeting sectors of voters (understandably so, given the massive internet attack the US suffered just a few weeks back) to an inside joke on the part of Facebook, given the social media platform’s somber mood the last few days.
Facebook Thursday: Fake news is not a problem
Facebook Friday: Mark Zuckerberg is dead. Your friends are dead. We are all dead.— Julia Carrie Wong (@juliacarriew) November 11, 2016
Facebook: we have no influence on your vote!
Facebook: stop complaining, please!
Facebook: ok fine y'all dead now— Harry Pavlidis (@harrypav) November 11, 2016
Considering that the bug affected even Facebook’s founder, Mark Zuckerberg himself, we’re gonna go out on a limb and say the page wasn’t discriminating against any one group.
Mark Zuckerberg is dead – Facebook confirmed – The Register https://t.co/rhOdrx7ooJ #mobility pic.twitter.com/pn9uHENUow
— Milo Camacho (@milo5714900) November 12, 2016
So what the heck WAS going on? Welp, according to a spokesperson for Facebook, the real reason for the slip-up is actually much, much simpler: “For a brief period today, a message meant for memorialized profiles was mistakenly posted to other accounts. That was a terrible error that we have now fixed.”
… oh.
The spokesperson did go on to say that Facebook “is very sorry that this happened and worked very quickly to fix it.”
Well, alrighty, then! Feels good to be alive, eh?
Were you one of the affected “dead” users? Share with us @BritandCo.
(h/t Cosmopolitan, photos via Flashpop + Milenko Bokan/Getty)