Backup Your Complete Facebook Profile | How To | Backup Facebook Profile |

Facebook is the world’s leading social network, with more than 800 million users worldwide. According to Alexa Web Information Company, it is currently the top website in the whole world! This means that a lot of people are now using Facebook to connect to their loved ones.
Unfortunately, it also means something else: it is a heaven for hackers who are looking for some fun. If you have a Facebook profile, there’s a lot that can go wrong, which is why backing up your information periodically is a good idea. Here, we will discuss about how you can go about backing up your Facebook profile.

Why would I want to back up my profile?

As I said, there is a lot that can go wrong. First of all, your account runs the risk of being hacked. Now once you’ve been hacked, you are completely at the hacker’s mercy. He may delete or deactivate your account, edit your personal information, or delete a particular piece of information etc. Indeed, these are some of the main motives for someone hacking into your account.

If you are about to implement changes, such as installing timeline, it is a good idea to back up your profile first before you lose your valuable information. Not only that, I also like to back up my Facebook profile once in a while so that I can more easily access my old messages, wall posts etc. If you are a regular Facebook user, I’d suggest you back up your profile every month or so, just to be on the safe side.

How to Backup Facebook Profile?

First of all, log onto your Facebook account and click on the down arrow next to Home on the top-right of your Facebook screen. From there, click on Account Settings.

Scroll below General Account Settings such as Name, Username, Email etc and you will see an option Download a copy of your Facebook Data. Click on it.

Next, click on Start My Archive. Clicking this will initiate the backup process. It’ll take Facebook some time to gather all your information and Archive it. So you will have to be patient. It may take an hour or more, depending upon the size of your profile. Once the archiving is finished, Facebook will send you an email with a link to download your archive. Download your archive and you’re done :).

What is included in the back up?

The archive will back up your;

• Profile information – your contact info, bio interests etc.
• Wall information – stuff that you or your friends have posted on your wall
• Friend list
• Photos and Videos you have uploaded to your account
• Comments you or your friends have made on your wall posts
• Notes
• Events  to which you have replied
• Messages – sent and received

All these things will be included in the backup. You will have to download a .zip file that contains all the above information. In addition, you will also get an HTML page that you can open and see all the backed up information.

Conclusion

Although this is a really useful feature, there are some features that could have made it better. You can’t back up information from groups and fan pages. And it is an only one way export. You can’t import your information back to your Facebook profile. The backed up information is for you and you alone.

Be warned though. The backed up filed contain your sensitive information. So make sure you keep them in a secure location. Or else, there is really no use backing your profiles. Good luck :)