Facebook Now Lets You Create Multiple Personal Profiles

pcmag.com:

Remember when Facebook made a big deal about using your real name years ago? It's been so long that it might be hard to remember when usernames were king and real identities were hidden for privacy. Facebook is now walking that back, though not entirely, as it rolls out support for multiple profiles.

To be clear, Facebook says your main profile still needs to be your real identity: "Our longstanding policy on Account Integrity and Authentic Identity states that your main Facebook profile must be in the name you go by in everyday life — and this is not changing. You can choose any name for your additional profiles, but not for your main profile."

Yes, everything is fair game once you get past that main profile. And to some extent, that makes sense. You may want to keep your personal life and professional life separate, after all. Facebook's announcement showed someone with a personal profile under "Benta Othman" and a secondary account called "Bente Bakes." That's clear enough on which is which.

And in that scenario, you could easily share personal updates and photos with family while sharing the latest about your small business with customers. In that respect, it almost mirrors Pages, which—when set up correctly—can act similarly to personal profiles.

But there's nothing in Facebook's announcement to suggest you can't use a fake name for your additional profiles, and indeed, as quoted above, it's only holding you to a real name on the main profile. Facebook's suggestion for a secondary profile is one to interact with friends and another to interact with the "foodie scene you love." It's easy to imagine a second profile with a fake name for worse uses.

Each profile has its own notification and privacy settings, and when