The launch of the search engine was announced on January 15. For now, it is only available to a handful of English-language users in the United States while it is being tested and improved.

But Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg claimed in a promotional video that Graph Search will eventually become one of the pillars of the social network, along with the newsfeed and timeline of each user.

«Today we’re really just starting off with a few basic types of things that you can search for: people, photos, places, pages for businesses, and that’s just the start,» he said. «We wanted to get this out as early as possible so we could get feedback from users, iterate, make the product better, and get it to a point where we can launch this to everyone. We just view this as a project that we’re going to be working on for years and years to come. But as it gets more completed, it’s just going to be this amazing resource for a lot of people around the world to use.»

Zuckerberg added that Graph Search could eventually become a business in its own right. That remark has social media experts making comparisons to rival firm Google, which has become the world’s dominant online search engine.

For now, Facebook isn’t trying to compete against Google’s ability to search everything publicly available on the Internet.

Instead, the Graph Search works only for material posted by the social network’s 1 billion users — including an estimated 240 billion photos as well as videos and other material — where Google searches often are unable to go.

With Graph Search, each user can look up anything that’s been shared with them personally on Facebook — even if it’s not available to the general public. That means different Facebook users will see different results when using Graph Search.

But users will also be able to search any content that any Facebook user has posted for public viewing on the site.

Abuse Concerns

According to Facebook Product Director Tom Stocky, Graph Search will change the way Facebook is used.

«There are really simple things that people want to do,» he said. «They want to find all of the photos they’ve liked. They want to find all the photos of two particular people [or] all the photos of their family. They want to find all of their friends who live in a particular city because they’re going to visit there. And those are really hard things to find right now. You have to go to a bunch of different pages and you have to piece all this stuff together. But now [with Graph Search], it’s easy. You just say what you want and you get the results.»

Some critics warn that Graph Search could be misused.

For example, sex offenders or predators could be able to conduct specific searches to find underage Facebook users to stalk.

Some Facebook users also worry that they will have to reexamine their own privacy settings on photos and posts to ensure that what they’ve shared with a friend doesn’t become easily available to the entire world.

The announcement concerning Graph Search is the first made by Facebook since its initial public offering in May 2012. Industry analysts say it was strategically timed ahead of its declaration of fourth-quarter earnings for 2012.

There have been rising doubts about Facebook’s growth potential among some investors, who worry that the number of Facebook users may have peaked.

By designing a search engine that encourages users to add more friends, analysts say Facebook networks become more active, and that encourages users to keep coming back.

In this sense, social media experts say Graph Search appears to be an attempt by Facebook to keep its users coming back so the firm can at least hold onto its current position as the world’s most-popular social network.

This article was compiled using news agency materials.

Facebook and RFE/RL’s Tajik Service website have been inaccessible in Tajikistan since January 17.

Asomuddin Atoev, the chairman of Tajikistan’s Association of Internet Service Providers, told RFE/RL on January 17 that service providers received SMS instructions from the Communications Service requesting that the sites be blocked.

But Zuhurov later told RFE/RL that his service had not given any such instructions.

In March and November, Tajik authorities blocked Facebook and several online news sites, but later unblocked them.

However, the service’s chief, Beg Zuhurov, told RFE/RL that his service had not given any instructions to block the sites.

Zuhurov suggested that the issue might have been caused by technical problems faced by the providers themselves.

Facebook and RFE/RL’s Tajik site are available via a limited number of providers, but only those that are not members of the Association of Internet Service Providers.

Tajik authorities blocked Facebook and several online news sites in March and November 2012. The sites were later unblocked.

Now a second installment has appeared online.

The businessman, Umarali Quvatov, was detained last month in Dubai and is fighting extradition to Tajikistan following accusations of fraud.

On January 10 he released an audio recording of an alleged taped telephone conversation between himself and Shamsullo Sohibov, a son-in-law of Tajik President Emomali Rahmon. In it, the man who is purportedly Sohibov complains roughly that Rahmon’s approval is needed for anything to get done in Tajikistan.

In the second recording, posted online on January 13, a man who is allegedly Sohibov offers Quvatov a bribe on condition that he leave Faroz, a company that Quvatov claims he and Sohibov co-owned before Quvatov was forced to leave the country.

In the roughly one-minute-long recording, the man who is purportedly Sohibov offers Quvatov what he calls “legal money” and tells Quvatov that if he accepts the money they will no longer be business partners. He adds that he would not let anyone “hurt” Quvatov. After Quvatov asks about the conditions of the deal, «Sohibov» tells him that if he leaves the company he will keep his promise and they will remain friends instead of enemies.

Quvatov’s aide, Nikolai Nikolaev, told RFE/RL’s Tajik Service on January 11 that his team was releasing the recordings in order to prove that Rahmon’s relatives used coercion and intimidation to take over Faroz. The company exports oil products via Tajik territory to Afghanistan.

Late last week, a spokesman for Faroz told RFE/RL that no one by the name of Sohibov works for the company. The company has also denied Quvatov’s involvement in it.

Quvatov was arrested on December 23 in Dubai at the request of Tajik authorities, who have accused him of committing $1.2 million in fraud. However, Quvatov claims he was instrumental in the creation of a network of companies controlled by Rahmon’s relatives and allies.

— Deana Kjuka; based on reporting by RFE/RL’s Tajik Service

In the roughly two-minute recording, a man who is purportedly Sohibov complains in profane language that nothing is done in Tajikistan without Rahmon’s approval. He says that Tajik ministers even sometimes deny his requests, despite his close relations with Rahmon through his marriage to presidential daughter Rukhshona Rahmonova.

While the YouTube clip contains little in the way of explosive claims, a Quvatov aide says it is merely the first of many that will expose corruption at the heart of the Rahmon regime.

The aide, Nikolai Nikolaev, told RFE/RL’s Tajik Service that Quvatov’s team is releasing the material in a bid to prove that Rahmon’s relatives used extortion and intimidation to take control of a company called Faroz that exports oil products to Afghanistan via Tajik territory. Quvatov claims that he and Sohibov were co-owners of Faroz before Quvatov was forced to leave the country.