Facebook question: Being added as a friend without my knowledge

Factual Questions
1

Can someone add me as their friend on facebook without me asking to be their friend or me agreeing to accept them as a friend after they ask?

I ask because it seems to be happening in my corrupt little town, according to a local blogger whom I trust. It seems that a board of education election is upcoming, and there are strange goings-on. Some people have reported that the more corrupt slate of candidates have been adding people as friends to their facebook page without the knowledge of the people.

I imagine this can be done. How is it done, and how can people prevent it from happening?

2

Other than by hacking into an account, you can’t become anyone’s Facebook friend without being asked.

3

No, it shouldn’t happen. You get the request and you can accept, decline, or just ignore it.

4

However, you can be added into a group without your approval. Maybe that’s what’s happening.

5

It is probably a group, since there are three candidates running. They have their slate with a totally misleading name, not dissimilar to the old German Democratic Republic which was anything but Democratic.

Anyway to stop such activities?

6

Well, if someone adds you to a group, you can instantly leave the group and then they can’t add you back into it again. They can’t force you to stay in the group.

That said, Facebook’s policy that you can add anyone to a group without their permission is really annoying and I wish they’d change it.

7

seriously, group membership should be by invite only. Like you either ask to be in the group or get invited and either decline to accept the invite.

8

It sounds like they have a group set up and are adding people to it without their knowledge. Like I said, the group is kind of a sleazy band of people and they are adding people with some name recognition in town to bolster their cause. The issue is that these people are not frequent facebook users, so they come on after a couple of weeks of inactivity and find out that they were added to the group some time ago.

Maybe I need to call Mark Zuckerberg. Anyone got his number? Probably won’t call him tonight because I think it is Yom Kippur. Or is that tomorrow night. Sorry, I’m not Jewish. Is Zuckerberg Jewish? I’m not sure.

9

That happened to me with a group planning my 30th high school reunion. I left the group as soon as I saw the notice, and that was the end of it. Really don’t think it should be possible to add people to groups without consent. Lots of potential for mischief there. A political candidate could subscribe his opponent to “Friends of NAMBLA Group” or some such.