Facebook is the world's largest social media platform with a net worth of 629.9 Billion dollars. And with over 2.38 billion active users, it also holds the details of over 30% of the world's overall population. In other words, Facebook is the biggest search engine to find people. If you want to know about a person, any business, find people in your locality or search event on the other side of the world, Facebook is your solution.
Since privacy is one of Facebook's biggest policy, you can't access that information unless you have a Facebook account. Well, it does sound good from the privacy point of view but what if you are in a hurry. Suppose, you want to know details about a company to check if it is legitimate or not and you can't. Maybe you can't log in, or there is some error, you hate facebook or you don't want to log in. In such cases, there are legal ways to find people without using a Facebook account. And this article will show you the ways.
Ways to Search Facebook without an account
Facebook Directory
Facebook being Facebook already thought about this issue and created a solution. The Facebook directory is Facebook's version of a phone directory which lets you search for people, pages, events, etc. just by entering their name. Using the Facebook directory is really simple. Enter "Facebook Directory" on google to access it. Once you opened the page, you will see names aligned in Alphabetical order. Enter the name you want to search, press Enter and you will get your result. Facebook does ask you to log in if you try to get more details than they are showing you.
But, If you are in a hurry than Facebook Directory would not be an ideal choice. It uses multiple captchas to check whether you are human or not every time you search a different name which gets really irritating with time.
Facebook People Search
Facebook People search is another way to check/gather info about someone who has a facebook account. Well, Facebook Directory does the same thing but there is a big difference. Unlike Facebook Directory which searches the whole Facebook, the People Search allows you to narrow down your search. Facebook people Search allows you to search for posts, pages, videos, market place, groups, etc. as well as offers you different types of filters so you can search really precisely.
As you can see in the picture, you can not only search people by name but you can also search post, events, group related to them. The Facebook People Search works better when logged in but you can use it without logging in as well.
Google Search Query
Google is the biggest search engine in the world and it works on certain parameters. One who understands Google search queries can easily narrow down its search to get to any person, business or event. Google query can be used to search for different types of URLs, file types, sites, and facebook profile as well.
To use Google Query, all you need to do is type " site:nameofyoursite.com", for example, let's say I have to search for someone named "Alice" on Facebook so I will type "site:Facebook.com Alice" on google. Doing so will lead me to a list of results related to Alice by Google which will further lead to a Facebook page with profiles related to that name. If you know how to choose your words you can precisely search the person you want to search about.
But always keep in mind that the amount of information you get always varies depending on the user privacy setting.
Social Search Engines
The fourth option is to use a social search engine. Now, what is Social Search engine? A social search engine is a platform where you can find publicly available data from multiple social sites. As Facebook started getting popular and several new social media platform such as Twitter, Instagram, etc. started to gain popularity, a new type of search engine was created, the Social Search Engines. The basic idea behind these search engines is to gather publicly available information on people, celebrities, companies, business and provide them at one place in clean order.
Best Social Search Engines
Some of the best search engines of the world are Pipl, Social Mention, snitch.name, Social Searcher and Buzzsumo. Search engines like Pipl can be used for searching people by their Name, Email, Phone or their Pipl Username. This site provides you access to data for more than 3-Billion people but you must have a Pipl account which is totally free to make.
A more precise search engine will be snitch.name. Unlike Pipl, snitch.name has a more precise search engine. It lets you decide the areas or social media platforms you want to search. As you can see in the picture below, you get the option to choose different social media platforms, type of profession, academics, blogs, etc. and using snitch.name does not need a snitch ID. You can get your intel without giving any intel for free.
The Bottom Line
These were some of the various ways to access Facebook data legally. Using search engines like Facebook Directory or People Search is a better option if you want to search for someone with less popularity, but these engines perform best when logged in. In case you are searching for a celebrity or someone popular, Google Query works the best. As for the social search engines, they come really handy when you want to gather as much information as possible from several different sources.
Well, that was all from my side, I hope that I am able to solve your problems via this article. Feel free comment in case of any queries- Thankyou!
