Facebook may have 275 mn duplicate accounts globally

: Facebook has approximately 275 million duplicate accounts out of its 2.50 billion monthly active users as on December 31, 2019, the social networking site said in its latest annual report.

"As ofDecember31, 2019, we had2. 50 billionMAUs (monthly active users), an increase of8 per cent from December31, 2018. Users in India, Indonesia and the Philippines represented key sources of growth in2019, relative to the same period in2018...

"In the fourth quarter of 2019, we estimated that duplicate accounts may have represented approximately 11 per cent of our worldwide MAUs. We believe the percentage of duplicate accounts is meaningfully higher in developing markets such as the Philippines and Vietnam, as compared to more developed markets," it said.

According to Facebook, a duplicate account is one that a user maintains in addition to his or her principal account.

While "false" accounts have been divided into two categoriesuser-misclassified accounts, where users have created personal profiles for a business, organisation, or non-human entity such as a pet and violating accounts,which represent user profiles that the site determine are intended to be used for purposes that violate FB's terms of service, such as spamming.

"The estimates of duplicate and false accounts are based on an internal review of a limited sample of accounts, and we apply significant judgment in making this determination," it explained.

Duplicate and false accounts are very difficult to measure at the scale and it is possible that the actual number of duplicate and false accounts may vary significantly from the estimates, it further said.

The networking site said in the fourth quarter of 2019, it is estimated that false accounts may have represented approximately 5 per cent of its worldwide MAUs.

Worldwide DAUs (Daily Active Users) increased9 per centto1.66 billionon average duringDecember 2019from1. 52 billionduringDecember 2018.

Users in India, Indonesia and the Philippines represented key sources of growth in DAUs duringDecember 2019, relative to the same period in2018.