Golden rule of spam filtering: a false positive is much, much worse than a false negative. Friends only messaging is a kind of Gordian Knot solution that is adm

Golden rule of spam filtering: a false positive is much, much worse than a false negative. Friends only messaging is a kind of Gordian Knot solution that is admirable in its boldness, but spam is a complex problem that requires a complex solution. Facebook shouldn't be taking the easy way out, especially as it becomes the de facto communication platform. Just to add a personal data point, I had a very similar experience with the author of the piece. Lost my wallet recently, and lo and behold, I got a Facebook message I never saw till today. Yes, 99% of all the "Other" messages were spam, but this was probably the most important FB message I ever got. Lucky for me I also had an ID card in there that the finder was nice enough to extrapolate my work email address from, but Facebook needs to address this.