US Patent 9203925 User search based on private information

In one embodiment, a method includes receiving a query specifying one or more criteria; locating a set of users that satisfies the one or more criteria, comprising: for each of a plurality of users belonging to a social-networking system, including the user in the set of users if the user satisfies the one or more criteria based on information associated with the user stored in the social-networking system, the information associate with the user including private information of the user stored in the social-networking system; and discarding the user otherwise; and sending at least a portion of the set of users in response to the query.