You can change who can message you from the message filters page where you can choose to block mails from single guys, people with no photos on their profile, those without verifications and other options.

We can access the site on Wifi but not on mobile network (or the other way round!). We get a connection/security/certificate error.

If you get a connection/security/certificate error accessing the site on 4G/mobile-data but not on WiFi (or, the other way round!) it means your mobile network (or ISP if on wifi) has blocked your device from adult content. Some mobile networks have started to do this to phones that have always been 18+ verified and some seemingly do it randomly. If you contact your mobile network on their helpline or via their website, you will see how to age verify your mobile account. The error you see is your ISP trying to display a message which does not show on a secure/ssl site like Fab. We've created a special page you can view which isn't served over secure/ssl so should be able to see the underlying message, here.

Once you have age verified your phone, your network usually advises turning the phone off then on again. It sometimes takes a few minutes then for the block to be removed.

User xyz keeps annoying us / messaging us / sending us stuff we don't want.

You can block specific individuals from contacting you using your user block list, or by clicking the "Block User" link at the left hand side of any profile page. If someone is being a problem you can also report using "Report Profile" link on their profile page.

I know that you have a single male blocker but I don't want to block all of them I would like to hear from the ones I have made friends with.

We've thought this through :) If someone is on your friends list, they will be able to contact you, regardless of this type of block. If you private message someone (or have ever private messaged them previously) they will be able to message you also.

Someone has blocked single males but their profile says they are looking for single males!

This means that they want to find and contact single males first, rather than be innundated with messages from them. If someone who has blocked single males messages you first, you'll be able to message them back.

I've forgotten my password

If you've forgotten your password you can request it here.

I'm getting a "Service Unavailable" message when I view my inbox / goto "my account" page

Delete temp internet files and reboot your PC will usually resolve this problem.

I'm seeing annoying/popup ads on the site.

We don't show pop up adverts on the site and we don't show any adverts at all if you are a site supporter.

If you are seeing pop up or unexpected/annoying adverts on the site, you almost certainly have "adware" or malware/spyware on your computer.

This type of annoying advert software sometimes comes with "free" software you've downloaded or arrives maliciously as a virus and serves up adverts to you depending on what you're looking at on the Internet.

You can learn more about adware on Wikipedia or read some tips for removing adware on about.com

If you're still having problems try posting to the forums on here asking for help.

I want to report another site member

The way to report other site users is via their profile page using the "Report Profile" link at the left hand side. Please don't use the usual contact form to tell us issues about other members.

What do the icons on the profiles mean?

Wants to meet today
In the chatroom
Verified genuine by other members
Photo verified
Has joined within the last three days

I've got a question about the new chat room

We've got a special FAQ page for the new chat room

Do you pass any numbers on when we text to upgrade? Do you send marketing texts?

NO. If you choose to upgrade to site supporter by text, we send one upgrade text with your PIN only. Fab doesn't actually receive your number as part of the text upgrade process (if you have upgrade problems and you need us to look into it, we have a secure interface to a system where we can lookup attempted upgrades from a specific number you supply us with, only). Our text partner who handles the billings does not sell or supply your number to 3rd parties either. Your number is never used for marketing texts. This is legally enforcable under the data protection act, and we and our text provider could get fines of hundreds of thousands of pounds if we broke this promise.

Text spammers often target blocks of numbers with a scattergun approach. If you receive spam text, you should ALWAYS report it to PhonePayPlus, the premium text regulator. They can force text spammers to close down their operations and apply large fines. They can also help you understand how your number came to be spammed. They have a form on their homepage where you can enter a premium text number and check the people operating it (including customer service numbers).

Goto their homepage and check a number

How do I get verified by other members?

You need to find someone who is already verified and ask them to verify you. If you are a couple or a woman then you can get verified by webcam. An easy way to do this is to go into the chatroom while you are both there, switch your webcam on and ask someone to verify you. If you are a single guy then you need to meet someone.

I've met someone but neither of us are verified so how can we verify each other?

One of you needs to be verified in order to verify the other person. Your best bet is for the female to get verified by another member e.g. on cam or by phonecall.

Verifications we try to leave for another user aren't being saved

If you're trying to verify another account that you have created yourself or you're trying to verify someone who is using the same PC as yourself, or you're on the same internet connection, then the verification won't be recorded. We do this to stop people creating fake accounts and verifying them themselves.

I'd like to remove a verification I've given to another member

(New, Sept 2010) If you block a user, verifications you have left will no longer show on their profile and similarly verifications they have left you will not show on yours. If you remove the block then the verifications will show again. Removing a verification will not remove a user's "verified tick", it only stops the verification text showing on their profile.

How do I change my username?

If you're a site supporter you can request a username change on the name change page.

If I change my username do I lose verifications / friends / other stuff?

No. Everything (including friends, verifications) stays the same and the only thing that changes is your username

How do we remove a block on someone? We've blocked them by accident / changed our minds / want to unblock them.

You can manage your blocks on individual users on your block list page (you can also get to this page via your "my account" page).

Why don't you right-click protect our photos to stop others stealing / saving them?

We believe in being straighforward with the members of Fab. Right click protect doesn't work and gives a false sense of security by pretending to "protect" images. Other sites may pretend they've protected your images but actually they're being dishonest by claiming that.

Right click "protect" can be gotten around in under 2 seconds by any of the following methods:

Simplest: Goto File menu, Save As, and save to desktop = The photos will be in a folder on your desktop that your browser has created.

OR... Disable JavaScript by going to Tools menu, choose Internet Options, Click the Security tab, click Custom Level, scroll to the "Scripting" section of the list and click Disable. Right click can now be used to save images.

OR... Press print screen and the image + page will be copied to clipboard where it can be pasted into a graphics program for resize or save.

We give you three privacy options on your photos and we now hide images from anyone who isn't a member of Fab. If you are worried about someone stealing your photos you may want to set them to be viewable only by your friends, or private in which case you can send by private mail.

We also now watermark all photos upon upload.

How many photos can I have on my account?

Currently the limit is 12. Before the server move it was 9 public and 9 private. If you had more photos on your account before the move you can keep them but you can't upload any more until you get below 12 (this is why occasionally you may see people with more photos than you have). If you want more photos than the 12, we give extra upload allowances to site supporters (these extra photos remain on your account even if you let your supporter status expire).

I want to leave the site, how do I delete my profile?

Go to the remove account page.

We've noticed a legal disclaimer paragraph that some people have on their profiles. Should we have one too? What are they about? Do they do any good?

The "legal disclaimer" is pointless nonsense and all does is take up extra space on our servers. Please remove it if you have it on your profile. If you're worried about privacy please set your account to be hidden from non-registered users on your privacy page (this also hides it from search engines but may take a week or two to drop out of search) and remove the notice (and encourage others to do likewise).

Common sense advice would be NOT to put any information on your profile (here, or on any such site) that could identify you or that you don't want to become public! So for your own benefit, don't post phone numbers, real names or email / instant message addresses on your profile that people might see or "Google".

Some people may put non-identifying pics on their public profile but keep face pics private or for friends, for example.

My account has been removed/deleted, can you get it back?

No. If you (or someone you've shared your password with e.g. your partner) has removed your account via the remove account page (which is the only way your account will have been removed), then like it says on the "delete account" page, your account has been permanently removed and can't be re-instated. Sorry.

I'm new here and am getting asked to enter a code when sending a message to prove I'm not a spammer? I'm not!!!

Don't worry, this is normal and we do this to protect everyone on the site. After a few days of using the site normally you'll probably not see this message again. We hope that having a site free of spam means this small inconvenience is worth it :)

There are too many rude people on here who don't reply to my messages!

It's not rude not to reply.
Some ladies and couples get hundreds of messages a day so it simply isn't possible for them to reply to everyone. If you don't get a response, you should assume they aren't interested. If you're getting a lot of "no-replies" then you should consider your profile and the messages you send. Are they giving the right message? Are you standing out from the thousands of other guys on here?

How do we add captions to our photos?

Unfortunately, you can't any more. This feature was lost when we moved servers in December 2008. We hope to bring it back at some point.

You don't respond to any of our mails.

We do this for fun and get hundreds of mails a day so we can't respond personally to questions about the site or your account. We recommend if you have a problem or can't figure out how something works, you post to the site help forum. If we responded to everything that people sent us, we'd spend all our time (and more!) doing that and not improving/running/fixing the site. Or, we'd have to employ customer service goons to read and respond to questions from a minority of users at everyone's expense and we'd not be able to do as much as we can for so little cost to you. We do read all mail you send and encourage feedback. If you have reported a problem with the site we will fix it.

I think someone else is logging into / has "hacked" my account!

If you think someone has gained access to your account you should immediately change your password on here via your change password page and on your associated email account if you're using web based email. You should run anti-virus and anti-spyware software to ensure that you don't have a keylogger or spyware installed on your computer.

We take the security of our site and database very seriously. The database server is on a seperate physical server behind a firewall to which only site owners have access, via a specified IP address. All passwords are encrypted and neither site owner nor admin have accesss to them.

The following are some common ways that accounts on Fab are compromised. Please be careful to avoid them!

1: Members share their password with friends, partners, lovers (this is the most common cause of "compromised" accounts).

2: Members login on other people's computers who run a keylogger (we see this via the login history of both parties, matched via verifications!).

3: In a couple, the partner changes/removes the profile and denies it (we see this because we record IP address and verify password of all account deletions).

4: The users use the same password on all sites they're on (including dodgy ones run by people who don't encrypt passwords), and site admins on other sites login using their info. On Fab, passwords are hidden from all users and admins.

5: The users email account is shared/compromised and the "hacker" gets their password from our initial signup email.

We'd like to add a link to Fab. Do you have any links/banners?

Yes. Visit our links and banners page.

What are the rules on photos we can upload?

You can read the full photo rules here.

I've not logged on for a while and now most of my messages have been deleted / I have loads of messages in my inbox and some of the older ones have gone missing

Fab is a super busy site. Hundreds of thousands of private mails are sent every day and we have tens of millions of such messages on our system. Because we do this mostly for free, we can't keep all the messages for ever because our costs would go up and up and the site would get slower and slower. Older messages that have already been read in "dormant" accounts that haven't been logged into for a while are removed from the system. Similarly if you have loads of mails in your inbox, the system will periodically remove some of the oldest.

If some mails are important to you and you want to make sure they're not deleted, become a site supporter and save any important mails to your "saved message folder" (look for "save it" on the bottom of messages you receive) and we'll keep those mails on the system (unless we screw things up and they get deleted too; but we'll try not to!).

Do you have any tips for safe meeting?

Please see the safer meets page

Why can't I leave a phone verification for a user anymore?

(Feb 2012) We've made the decision to remove PHONE as a valid verification method. In our experience of reviewing thousands of reports on fake users, PHONE is often used to gain verifications for fake or misleading accounts. For example, a couple might verify by phone but use photos that are not of themselves. A male posing as a female can also often trick people by phone.

We can only now accept verifications by cam (after you have checked it's not a recording e.g. by asking them to hold their hand up) or after a meet. We believe that this change will mean that verified accounts continue to be trusted by the community. We're not removing any phone verifications that were left before we made this change on 25th Feb 2012. If you verify someone by phone from this date, we'll remove your tick. Don't forget that if you're getting started on the site, a great way to prove you are who you say you are is to photo verify.

Do you run any other sites?

In Jan 2010 we launched a site for gay and bisexual guys called Fab Guys at fabguys.com.

Are you on twitter?

Yes! Follow us and send us tweets @fabswingers.

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