While Twitter is leading the charge when it comes to innovative new features in 2014, Facebook isn’t far behind.

Not content with creating a Snapchat clone, Facebook is now dabbling in making it easier to connect with friends.

Friendship short cut

According to a report on The Next Web, Facebook is trialling a new way to find friends, which is being dubbed ‘shortcuts’.

The feature works by offering users a unique eight digit number to find friends, similar to a phone number.

The user then enters this number and is automatically taken to their friend’s Facebook page.

Phone home

Using numbers to locate friends makes sense, as Facebook’s user base expands as the number of user names doubles and triples up.

A unique number could make it easier to connect with all the long lost Smiths, Joneses and Lees in your life.

At the time of writing the ‘shortcuts’ feature was only available to a select group of Facebook users.

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