I have contacts without a "delete" option

Question

Level 2

407 points

I have contacts without a "delete" option

iPhone 5s, iOS 7.02

MacBook, Snow Leopard, iTunes 11.1

Today I noticed that I have twice as many contacts in my iPhone Contacts app than in my Mac's Address Book app. I looked at these "extra" contacts in the iPhone and they are a random 10% of my total Facebook friends.

So I tried the "Info > Advanced > Replace information on this iPhone: Contacts" option in iTunes and synced. No change. No matter how many times I sync, these "extra" unwanted contacts stay on the phone. I was not, and have never, used iCloud for Contacts... I only sync to my MacBook.

All I wanted is for the profile photos in my contacts to sync with Facebook and since discovered a setting on the iPhone that seems to do this automatically. I was previously trying out third party apps like Sync.me but have stopped using and deleted them all. I do not want all of my Facebook friends, or a random sampling of my FB friends, to be in my Contacts app, that would be ridiculous. I just want my existing contacts, if they're on Facebook, to have their Facebook profile photo.

I figure I'll just need to manually remove these extra 40+ contacts from the iPhone. HOWEVER, problem is that there's no "delete" link at the bottom of these particular random contacts! What? Ironically, I can delete any of the contacts that I want to keep, but these unwanted contacts from Facebook cannot be deleted at all... no "delete" link.

Suggestions? Thank-you!

iPhone 5s, iOS 7, 32 GB

Posted on Oct 1, 2013 9:09 AM

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Answer 1

Jan 30, 2017 2:33 AM in response to sparky67

Hello Apple

I have couple of contact number and I am not be able to Delete them,I just wanted to know what's happening is it from my phone or something else,than

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Answer 2

sparky67 Author

Level 2

407 points

Oct 1, 2013 9:45 AM in response to sparky67

Through some experimenting, here's what I found.

iPhone Settings > Facebook > "ALLOW THESE APPS TO USE YOUR ACCOUNT" >

then there are three toggle options...

Calendars - ON

Contacts - ON

Facebook - ON

If I toggle "Contacts" to OFF, then my problem disappears.

Simply "allowing" my Contacts App to use my Facebook account shouldn't bring in a bunch of unwanted contacts without warning!

Now I'm wondering if the profile photos will still sync with Facebook...

There is a link called "Update All Contacts" at the bottom of this settings page. This seems to be all I wanted, but hoped that by toggling the "Contacts" option above, this would be a bit more automatic.

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Answer 3

markwmsn

Level 6

14,987 points

Oct 1, 2013 9:40 AM in response to sparky67

How about turning off Contacts' access to Facebook once you have updated the common contacts?

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Answer 4

sparky67 Author

Level 2

407 points

Oct 1, 2013 9:57 AM in response to markwmsn

Now that I figured out this was the cause, leaving it OFF it exactly what I'll do. The "Update All Contacts" button, by it's own description underneath itself, seems to be all that's needed to sync profiles photos.

It's just odd that this other option (allow Contacts App to access Facebook) causes a bunch of Facebook friends to load into the Contact app. In my case, only about 10% of my total.

If that's the intended behavior, then I would want to see a warning, and all Facebook friends should load in. (I don't think friends' FB privacy settings is the reason they didn't, since some of these loaded in with no phone or email)

If that's not the intended bahavior, then this is a bug.

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Answer 5

markwmsn

Level 6

14,987 points

Oct 1, 2013 10:50 AM in response to sparky67

There may be some filtering going on that is not apparent.

I have a guess, based on a small sampling of my own Facebook friends. Only 50 appear in my Contacts. It seems that the ones that are visible in my Contacts under the Facebook group are the friends that have a visible phone number or email address on Facebook. The ones that have no visible phone number or no visible phone number (other than blah@facebook.com) do not seem to appear in Contacts. It is possible that a postal address will also qualify; I do not yet have a counterexample.

This makes a certain amount of sense to me. Why show me a Facebook contact in Contacts if it would supply no information?

Whoops, I just found a counterexample to this simple guess. One of my sisters has a visible phone number on Facebook, but does not appear in my Contacts "Facebook: group.

However, the phone number she makes public on Facebook is already in my Contacts from other sources, so I'll refine my comment: Why show me a Facebook contact in Contacts if it would supply no new information?

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Answer 6

May 30, 2014 12:34 PM in response to sparky67

Somehow I got 2 unwanted contacts on my iphone that I couldn't get rid of. I noticed that both contacts were from my Facebook "friends" and had somehow synced themselves to my phone. I went to my Facebook account and "unfriended" both of them. I then went back to my iphone and went to "all contacts". I then went to each contact I didn't want, hit the edit button, scrolled down to "delete contact" hit that and the contact finally deleted.

Don't know if this is hopefully to anyone else put it worked for me!

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