Facebook has said it is working on using artificial intelligence to prevent a common and upsetting problem: receiving notifications about deceased friends and loved ones.

The company said it hoped to stop the “painful” experience of getting suggestions to invite dead people to events, or to wish them a happy birthday.

On profiles, tributes to a person will now appear separately, keeping the deceased’s timeline as they left it.

"We hope Facebook remains a place where the memory and spirit of our loved ones can be celebrated and live on,” said Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s chief operating officer.

Users have often complained about being shocked and upset when Facebook nudges them to interact with a deceased loved one.

Since 2009, Facebook has given users the ability to “memorialize” profiles; a status which adds “Remembering” to the person’s name and allows friends to post messages (more than 30 million people do this every month, Facebook said).

Once a page has been memorialized, it no longer appears within notifications as if that person were still alive. But, for profiles of deceased users that have not yet been memorialized, Facebook said it would use AI to stop those accounts from appearing in unexpected places as well.

BBC