Code snippet from a tutorial on willconkwright.com about how to gather public data using the Facebook Graph API and PHP.

Facebook API Call Using PHP

<?php

/**
 *  @category   Tutorials
 *  @version    1.0 [June 14, 2017]
 *  @author     Will Conkwright
 *  @copyright  Copyright (c) 2017 Circle Squared Publishing, LLC
 *  A custom function for getting public data from the Facebook Graph API
 */


/**
 * Storing sensitive records outside of the webroot adds a level of
 * security to your application. In the fb_token.php file we've
 * defined a constant named FB_API_KEY. This constant stores the value
 * of our access token.
 */

require_once ('/Users/admin/Documents/accessTokens/fb_token.php');

/**
 * The facebook data array varialbe is an associative array that contains
 * all the parameters to find the data we need.
 */

$facebook_data_array = array(
  'base_url'     => 'https://graph.facebook.com/v2.9/',
  'node'         => 'search?',
  'query_param'  => 'q=',
  'root_node'    => 'type=place',
  'coords'       => 'center=35.7796,-78.6382',
  'fields'       => 'fields=name,talking_about_count',
  'access_token' => 'access_token=' . FB_API_KEY,
);


/**
 * The get_facebook_data function accepts one argument, the array of
 * values that comprise the URL to the data we are trying to collect. We
 * simply concatenate the values and store the string in the $url
 * variable. We're using PHP's built in curl library to pass the URL to
 * the browser and storing the response in the $response varialbe.
 */

function get_facebook_data( $args ) {

  /* Concatenate the array values. */
  $url = $args['base_url'] . $args['node'] . $args['query_param'] . '&' . $args['root_node'] . '&' . $args['coords'] . '&' . $args['fields'] . '&' . $args['access_token'];

  /* Initiate request. Store the results in the $response varialbe */
  $ch = curl_init();
  curl_setopt( $ch, CURLOPT_URL, $url );
  $response = curl_exec( $ch );
  curl_close( $ch );

  /* Return the values in the $response variable. */
  return $response;

}


/**
 * Call the function and display the results in the browser.
 */

get_facebook_data( $facebook_data_array );


?>