The appearance of profiles under a “people you might know” or similar heading on social media platforms, including TikTok, signifies the platform’s algorithm suggesting potential connections based on shared data. This data can include mutual contacts, location information, participation in similar groups or events, and even uploaded contact lists. The result is a list of profiles that the user might recognize or have interacted with in other contexts.
The principal benefit of this feature lies in facilitating network expansion. Individuals are exposed to accounts of people with whom they share offline ties, potentially strengthening existing relationships or forging new ones. Historically, these suggestions relied on relatively simple data points, like mutual friends on earlier social networks. As algorithms have advanced, they incorporate increasingly complex data sets to provide more accurate and relevant connection suggestions.
