Address book keeps duplicating contacts

[bmac89]

Hi,

My apple address book keeps multiplying my contacts - now I have 16 duplicates of each contact. Some are in blocks while others are scattered throughout the address book. I can't get them to sort into alphabetical order either. It is very frustrating and time consuming when sending out an email to all contacts and I have to manually add them.

Any ideas what is going on and how to fix it?

Many thanks.

 

[BrianBaughn]

Try to guess what other information we might need to help you and post it here.

 

[Portaluk]

I had a similar issue with my contacts and calendar events.

I may be wrong as it was some time ago, but in my case it was something to do with my phone backing up via iTunes when i plugged it in to charge and also having iCloud on (or iCloud recently disabled). So every time I plugged my phone into my mac or sync via wi-fi it was creating duplicates.

Sorry its a bit vague with no direct solution, it was a few years ago, but are you by any chance plugging your phone or iPod into your mac or syncing via wi-fi? If so have a look at your device in iTunes and see how you have set it to sync and back up your data.

 

[bmac89]

Sorry, I realised immediately after posting the thread that I did not give details.

I am running Snow Leopard 10.6.8 on macbook.
I have no Icloud account attached to the computer and I have not plugged in any phone or restored from any backups.

The contacts just keep duplicating for no apparent reason and the next time I turn on the computer there will be more duplicate copies. I have not added or edited any new contacts to the address book since. It started a long while ago (probably about a year) and has been an issue ever since.

Thanks

 

[BrianBaughn]

Just to be clear...you not syncing Contacts with any outside services or third-party applications?

 

[bmac89]

Just to be clear...you not syncing Contacts with any outside services or third-party applications?

Correct. Contacts were manually added to the address book. There is no cloud, syncing or backups restored. The address book is unique to the computer and all contacts were manually added.

Thanks for the reply.

 

[BrianBaughn]

Sounds like some sort of contacts database corruption. I haven't looked but there may be some old info out on the internet from when Snow Leopard was the prevalent OS.

You might have to export your contacts, root around in the system to delete all the associated contact stuff, then start over and import your export.