PSA: Facebook Messenger Shares Your Location With Every Message
You probably know that Facebook collects a ton of information about you, but if you use the Messenger mobile app, that means your location as well. A new Chrome extension called Marauders Map lets anyone you send a message to see this location information immediately.
By default, the Messenger mobile app logs your location with every message (you can see if it’s on if the GPS icon next to the text box turns blue). Even if you don’t choose to actively send your location, it’s built into the message itself. Open the Messenger app now and tap on a message from someone else. There is a good chance that you will receive a map with the location from where they sent this message. As the creator of the Marauders Map extension points out , the extension allows you to see all the collected information at once to make it easier to track wherever they are. Fortunately, this creepy feature is easy to disable:
On Android:
- Tap the Menu icon> Settings> Location Services.
- Uncheck the box that enables location services.
On iOS:
- Go to Settings> Privacy> Location Services.
- Lovely Facebook Messenger on the list and turn off the location option
This should prevent Messenger from sending your location in future messages, but it won’t delete old location information, so keep that in mind. If someone were to use the extension mentioned above, they could still track your previous locations quite easily.