Heads up, Facebook users, because all of your public posts are becoming searchable by anyone.
Facebook today posted a “Search FYI” on its blog to detail the improvements that it’s bringing to its search functionality. The updated Facebook Search will let you “find out what the world is saying about topics that matter to you” by searching recent public posts as well as posts from your friends.
In Facebook’s demo, a search for “water on mars” brings up posts that are divided into a few different sections. Those include Top Posts, including ones from CNN and PBS; Posts from Friends and Groups; and Public Posts, which will bring up recent posts from anyone that’ve been marked as public.
The updated Facebook Search will also help you to find public conversations and will offer you timely, more personalized search suggests. With the latter update, Facebook will highlight things that are happening right now as you type, helping you to follow events as they happen.
Facebook says that it’s got more than 2 trillion — yes, with a “T” — posts in its index, so there are plenty of posts to search through. This new Facebook Search update is notable because it’ll show you public posts from people that you don’t know and have never met, which might make some folks uncomfortable. As always, though, if you don’t want something you say to be seen by everyone, you should probably not post it or send a private message to the people that the post is intended for.
This updated Facebook Search is rolling out today on iPhone, Android, and the desktop.