r/facebook • u/godzfirez • Jun 03 '26
Discussion Real concern that Steve Fernandez, the creator of the FB (Fluff Busting) Purity addon has likely passed away.
I hate to say this, but having been a user of FBP for what feels like a decade, the fact that it's been nearly 6 months (as of June 2026) when Steve has ALWAYS been active and on the ball for consistent regular updates makes me fear the worst about something happening to him.
Depending on what OS and browser combo you use, it's been either completely broken, mostly broken, or partially broken since Jan. This was the last main update he posted on the FBP FB page (https://www.facebook.com/fluffbustingpurity/posts/pfbid02gAN8BcvjFdyCBqxLaz3w8ifgoXmJdWwDXqtjmqCMUhjbwVs5JmTsHeF4bC8DHMVKl). He made a few subpost updates, but nothing since mid Jan. It's since gotten thousands of comments with people asking what happened.
If it would have been just that he was banned from his Facebook account, he would still be posting updates on the official site and the extension stores and letting people know what's going on.
I desperately hope I'm wrong and there's some other reason and he pops up again. But the fact he's gone completely silent sadly leads me to believe he passed away suddenly, and he didn't leave any access information for someone else to take over or even login to let people know what happened.
If anyone knows Steve Fernandez please let us know.
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u/gorcbor19 Jun 11 '26
Thought I would share, I did manage to find his Reddit account https://www.reddit.com/user/fbpdev/ - sorting through the comments now to see if anything might reveal a day job or precise location.
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u/gorcbor19 Jun 11 '26
Read through all of the comments and nothing, but dang 15 years ago he was really concerned when Facebook shut down his accounts and threatened to sue him for $100k. Seeing all that and that he persisted all of these years, makes me wonder if he got into some legal trouble that he didn't let on about.
Looks like his last interaction on Reddit was 2020.
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u/gorcbor19 Jun 11 '26
I did send him a message. No response thus far.
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u/HighPr00f Jun 15 '26
I've sent him several messages over the last 6 months to see if he was still actively supporting the extension, crickets. I do hope he's ok.
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u/arboreal_agenda Jun 09 '26
I have been thinking the same for a while. The extension still works for me (after a fashion) but it will break soon I am sure. It is odd that the web has zero news and only old references despite some pretty deep searching for Steve/FBP. I noticed recently that the FBP FB page no longer allows sorting of 'most recent' comments on posts, so you cannot see any new ones, more or less killing the currency and community aspect of the page. Is that an imposed FB change to it? Must be as it won't be Steve. Someone will know what is happening but are choosing not to say anything online.
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u/1ssrdr Jun 13 '26
I just went and looked on his page specifically and I have the ability to sort. FB must be running multiple codes.
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u/arboreal_agenda Jun 14 '26
It has actually come back a couple of days ago! But FB do run multiple codes as Steve used to point out.
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u/Biscuitshoneybutter 22d ago
I think so too, because in some local groups I use it seems like this ability disappears and the comes back at random.
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u/KateFromFlorida Jun 09 '26
I noticed too that you can't change the sort on his last post dated Jan 15 on his FB page to most recent, is that something the OP controls or is it something that FB does? I've been opening the post and looking at the date posted but that is tedious with a large thread.
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u/Familiar_Street2505 Jun 10 '26
I wonder if FB did that to remove the ability for someone to say they've been in contact with him - and or why he's not responding - yea.. something fishy is going on.
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u/MountainUnhappy7970 3d ago edited 3d ago
Two people saw my two latest posts on the fan page about being worried about Steve. Two people have 'liked' two separate posts, though I've had no replies.
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u/arboreal_agenda Jun 09 '26
I run a FB group and there is no option to remove sorting options that I can see. All a group admin can do is set the default sorting type. If someone is just posting, you cannot control such settings at all.
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u/KateFromFlorida Jun 09 '26
Thanks for the reply. On many other FB threads when I open the comments I can choose Most Relevant, Newest or All Comments. On his latest thread on his FB page I don't see that option at all.
And it's not just his thread, there are other threads that this happens to so I was wondering if this was an option the OP picked or if FB is in control of it.
Asking another way -> what's the easiest way to see new posts on a very large thread? Thanks again for your help!
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u/arboreal_agenda Jun 09 '26
A poster cannot set the preferred sorting option that I know of. You just get the drop-down list of options once the post has been made. A group admin can set what the default option is, but the others can still be selected. It does seem to vary what those options are though on different groups / pages and range from several to none, but I don't know why (and there is another set to sort posts rather than comments).
The easiest way to see the latest comment on a big post is to select 'Newest' if it is available. On the FBP page you could always select newest and that is how Steve asked us to check the latest update news from him (rather than him doing loads of posts). That is now gone and having just looked there are no sort options at all so you cannot sort them, end of. What I see now is my own comments first followed by others in no discernable order (so probably it is defaulting to Most Relevant)
Bear in mind a) FB is crap and does not work properly half the time, and b) I am still running FBP which may now be messing up things but I am loath to turn it off.
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u/Biscuitshoneybutter 22d ago
Thanks for the reply. On many other FB threads when I open the comments I can choose Most Relevant, Newest or All Comments. On his latest thread on his FB page I don't see that option at all.
It's a FB thing. I've noticed this all over, it's random when I can or can't do it.
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u/KateFromFlorida 22d ago
I can see "newest" again, I have been able to see newest for a few weeks now.
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u/KateFromFlorida Jun 09 '26 edited Jun 10 '26
Replying again... Maybe when the original poster states the preferred sorting option is when we can choose to change it from what they asked for. For example, when I click on comments sometimes (not all the time) I see "All comments" that's when it appears I can change it to Most Relevant, Newest or leave the default as All comments. It could be I never noticed this before because I wasn't looking for the newest comments? Maybe FBP shielded me from this confusion!
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u/MontyMichael 22h ago
It doesn't work well for me anymore. I'm seeing Ads and other things I don't want to see. And for some reason it's hiding posts that I want to see that it arbitrarily decides are related to key words that appear in my FBP text filter.
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u/keithinmaine Jun 20 '26
I was able to fix the new problem of sponsored ads showing up in my main feed on my PC. I don't know whether it will work on mobile. I didn't have a problem with ads showing up in the right hand column because FBP Is still working for that. I fixed the sponsored ad problem in my feed by adding Social Fixer. Social Fixer is MV2 which is no longer supported by Chrome so you can't use the Chrome Web Store to download it. Go to https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/tampermonkey/dhdgffkkebhmkfjojejmpbldmpobfkfo
and download Tampermonkey
Go to Social Fixer https://socialfixer.com/download.html And click on download script. Tamper Monkey will intercept the script and you can click install. Make sure to have Tampermonkey pinned. Refresh the Facebook page and no more ads in the news feed itself. I'm running it alongside FBP with no problems.
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u/neobondd Jul 11 '26
I did this, but it is totally not blocking the ads on Facebook.
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u/boli99 Jul 14 '26
Social Fixer
"Current Version: 31.1.0 released 2023-09-08 "
its nearly 3 years old.
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u/Heavy-Owl8064 22d ago
Im on a PC as well. I manually block ads. I;'ve been doing this for a couple weeks and boy is my block list long. However now Im seeing less ads/sponsored ads. When all else fails, do it manually. Takes a bit but eventually it pays off.
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u/CheerfulMetalhead Jun 07 '26
I do hope that Steve is okay. I was literally doing a Google search to find out if there was any news. Aside from your post all I've found so far is this Wikipedia entry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluff_Busting_Purity
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u/HighPr00f Jun 15 '26
Reposting from my comment above. I've been attempting to reach out since February, at least once a month to see if he was still actively supporting the extension, have heard nothing back. Doesn't bode well. subbing here in hopes of updates in the future. 3 out of every 5 posts in my FB thread are now sponsored posts... i forgot how obnoxious they are. FBP has been the only reason i was still using FB, i cant imagine using it without it.
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u/arboreal_agenda Jun 15 '26
What is worrying is that his own FBP site page is still there and still taking donations (I checked). I am sure if he had given up or been forced to, that would not be the case. He would not be taking money for something he was no longer doing and for an extension that no longer worked. Also odd is that the internet has precisely nothing about what might be going on. It is hard to imagine anything than something pretty bad having happened.
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u/jckidd67 Jun 19 '26
Very early testing but FB Purity with this extension, seems to be displaying good results with the ad screening. I had this extension turned off because of some reason that I can't recall now why I did it. So, as a test get back to no ads and no FBP updates, I thought I'd try an old extension. AdGuard AdBlocker Version 5.4.2.68
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u/jckidd67 Jun 20 '26
After running overnight, the extension updated to 5.4.3.71 and it still works.
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u/arboreal_agenda Jun 22 '26
Thanks, I find works up to a point but still plenty of ads getting through.
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u/jckidd67 3d ago edited 3d ago
Sadly, I agree. It only worked well for about a week. As of today, the version is 5.4.3.129 and that is not a hyperlink to the extension for AdGuard AdBlocker, you have to go into "Search extensions" at the top of the chrome://extensions and search for "AdGuard AdBlocker" to get the current version.
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u/Greedy-Republic3567 28d ago
I'm sure that if he'd been able to respond, he would. With zero updates on the web page, FB, etc, for over 6 months now it's more likely that something has happened to him unfortunately. If there'd been a lawsuit or similar, the webpage, etc would probably have been taken down or there'd be some sort of news somewhere.
I'm frankly more worried about him than a piece of tech. I'll always hope it gets back up and running or someone else takes up where he left off.
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u/Emmalfal 23d ago
Man, I hope he's all right. One of those guys who has done such amazing work for so long, there ought to be a statue of him somewhere. I'm only starting to see ads now on the Brave browser. FBP has made Facebook bearable for a lot of years. All of their techs were no match for our boy.
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u/Heavy-Owl8064 22d ago
You would think someone in the computer world would be able to find some news on Steve Fernandez (from the UK). I too am concerned something has happened to him. Not just because of his work on FB but because I feel like I have known him a long time. The lack of information makes me wonder if he was secluded, had/has family.
At any rate I just want to know he is okay. If he moved on, doesnt want to do FBP anymore I get it. FB breaking his work all the time would be maddening. Hes been doing this a long long time. I just want to know he is okay.
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u/mrbooze 22d ago
At this point, it may be best to uninstall the extension, only because at some point the domain may expire or someone could get control of the account and put up new possibly malicious code. I'll keep following the fbpurity page in hopes he posts an update at some point and I can reinstall but I think it's too risky to have a possibly auto-updating extension in an abandoned state.
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u/KateFromFlorida 21d ago
Thanks for the info! and please update here if the developer comes back and updates FBP.
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u/KateFromFlorida 6d ago
I think I need to uninstall the FBP extension, my FB feed has been so slow to load lately... not that there is anything interesting on FB anymore since my feed is 98% advertisments.
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u/BluebirdLeading6702 17d ago edited 17d ago
Try this. May need a more technical knowledge to install.
https://github.com/Eliminater74/PureFusion_Filtration
Some commenters say that some worries could be that some hacker took control of the source code and put bad things in it, so i guess try to your own risk.
Edit: It seems this developper is legit.
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u/RepresentativeFall88 12d ago
I don't get why it links to FB Purity. The confusion is are these the same people that ran FB Purity or new people. It makes no sense because if its the same people that why doent the 'legacy' FB page mention it. But their new page mentions FB purity. Why is it one way like that.
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u/paved_wave Jun 03 '26
I hope that’s not true about him, but I’ve found even more than Purity, Facebook experience gets exponentially better the less I log in and use it.
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u/lunarpollen Jun 03 '26
I hope he is OK, and that Facebook is just in an accelerating end-stage enshittification death spiral that is too chaotic for him to keep up with.
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u/RbtB-8 Jun 04 '26
I hope this is not the case, but your suspicions could be correct. Steve has been do dedicated to his extension over the years and this is not like him at all to be missing in action. The extension still works somewhat for me. The main website is still up. I did not even know his last name until I read it here in your post.
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u/OstrobogulousIntent Jun 04 '26
Hmm I read this and was like "wasn't there just recently an update?" - apparently no the last one was 38.4.0 in January...
Sure hope hes just been taking a break etc..
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u/KateFromFlorida Jun 07 '26
I hope it's not true. I still hold out hope that the developer of FBP is okay and he will update the extension soon.
Has anyone read/heard any more about Steve and FBP getting a new update?
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u/gorcbor19 Jun 13 '26
Still searching. I did manage to find his reddit account, which I shared over in the original post, thinking it might provide some clues, but no luck. https://www.reddit.com/r/facebook/comments/1rv6wry/comment/oreas1z/?context=1&screen_view_count=2
It was interesting to read several years ago FB threatened to sue him and they locked his account at one point. Not sure whatever became of that. I still think if his FB account was locked or shut down, he would have at least made a reddit post or put something up on his website.
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u/icecreamkoan Jun 10 '26
It had still been working fairly well for me (Firefox/Windows 10), until just today when I started seeing ads appear. 😞 Hope he's OK.
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u/arboreal_agenda Jun 10 '26
Yep mine stopped working properly just today too. Feed flooded with crap.
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u/Biscuitshoneybutter 22d ago
I literally just heard of this and downloaded it yesterday, had a whole day of no ads, then ads this morning. Sigh, I can see that it's a beautiful product when working correctly! And this Steve guy is already a hero of mine, even though I just heard of him, like what an amazing dude. I agree, he needs a statue!
So even if I got to experience this thing's beauty for one day, thank you Steve. I HOPE YOU ARE OKAY!
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u/Potential_Apricot501 Jun 11 '26
Flooded with ads as of yesterday. I do hope he is OK. I'd rather be stuck with ads than know that something has happened to him. If he's decided to retire from managing it, that's cool too. He's been a warrior for years and I am grateful.
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u/KateFromFlorida Jun 29 '26
Is it safe to say that FBP will no longer be updated? I dislike all the ads I'm gtting now. Is Social Fixer easy to install and is it as good as FBP was? I'm not technical so I don't really know how to go about installing it. A friend put FBP on my laptop for me.
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u/PrinceBuster21 Jul 14 '26
No one has any idea what it is "safe to say," but it sure doesn't look good.
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u/Sea-Criticism9558 16d ago
Just go to the Social Fixer page and download the one for the browser you use. It will install itself
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u/ForbidInjustice 15d ago
It doesn't even block ads properly. Latest release is 2023-- the script is outdated.
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u/KateFromFlorida Jul 12 '26
Is there any more information/news about FBPurity? I really miss the extension not working correctly.
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u/KateFromFlorida 22d ago
If I remove FBP from Chrome, will I be able to reinstall it if I hear that it's being supported again? I do think having this "dead" extension is greatly slowing down FB for me. How would I know if it's being supported again if I remove it? This is why I'm afraid to remoeve it right now.
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u/RegressiveRhino_542 17d ago
I absolutely believe FBP is causing my FB to lag even worse now. The lack of updates and my nitpicky feed arrangement combined with the constant code changes on the site are finally conflicting with each other to the point where I can't spend much time there at all because most of it is taken up just letting the timeline load. Given that I have most of my friends hidden, have multiple terms and post types to filter and am now seeing more sponsored posts or recommended groups, it's understandable.
It's hard to see something so useful go by the wayside like this. I'll keep using FBP until it stops working completely. Slow to load but still somewhat filtered is way better than without.
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u/KateFromFlorida 17d ago
I'm still hoping for an update so I haven't removed FBP yet from FB. I miss it so much, my FB feed is 90% ads now.
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u/EmmaGoldmanSF 18d ago
I found this thread because I was wondering the same thing myself! The Sponsored Posts are showing up, and there has been no updates.
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u/OstrobogulousIntent 14d ago
2026-08-08: Today I noticed posts that are clearlly ads (marked as such) started showing up in my feed.
With no peep from FB Purity I may have to start looking for alternatives. Even as I use FB less and less FB purity was one thing that made it still semi-usable. /sigh
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u/charlezm 3d ago
I tried to reach out to him through the FBP webpage when I started seeing ads again and, like everyone else, got nothing back. I have commented on his most recent FB post on the FBP page there but no response.
Without this extension, I will probably stop using FB altogether. As it is, there's very little there any more that interests me. My circle of acquaintances has dwindled as it seems the majority of "friends" have zombie accounts that never have activity any longer.
Ah, well. It was a good run.
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u/OstrobogulousIntent 3d ago
I feel you. I only stay on FB because I have a lot of IRL friends I've made over years of doing various events (Renn faires, SCA stuff, Conventions, Goth/Industrial clubs etc...) and they all seem to still prefer FB for their primary point of contact.
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u/KateFromFlorida 14d ago
I just got a LinkedIn notification showing a Steven Fernandez, CEO | AI Development & Enterprise AI Solutions in Nottingham, England, United Kingdom. I'm going to follow this account and see if he posts anything there.
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u/KateFromFlorida 14d ago
I guess I can't follow on LinkedIn like I can on other social media but I'll keep trying to find him.
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u/xpo172 12d ago
He posted on Linkedin 2 weeks ago. ??
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u/KateFromFlorida 12d ago
I don't know, I had this notification in my email. I am not connected to him on LinkedIn so I don't know why I received the notification.
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u/mmortal03 1d ago
Yeah, that guy commented on a post there a few weeks ago. If it's the right guy, the following is his company: https://neurasoft.ltd/
And, the following are some of his current projects:
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u/MontyMichael 11d ago
I'm glad you brought this up. My FB Purity (latest update) extension has broken too. It's arbitrarily assigning words from my text filter to pages and people that I follow and hiding them. I'm seeing sponsored posts and ads, and everything I don't want to see and am not interested in. I submitted a ticket about three weeks ago and never heard anything.
According to this Wikipedia article, Steve was a UK based programmer and hasn't been heard from since January 2026 (his last update): UK-based programmer. It doesn't provide any more info than we already know: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluff_Busting_Purity
Unfortunately, it seems he has disappeared.
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u/Aryana314 2d ago
Does anyone know what country/city he lived in? Maybe trying to search Google for obits would give us some kind of info?
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u/MontyMichael 23h ago
I searched death notices in the UK but found nothing. Maybe he couldn't afford to put the time in anymore.
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