[thegrif]

tl;dr: The recommendation is likely driven from you and the provider adding each other to a contacts app LinkedIn has been authorized to source connection data from.

The "People You May Know" feature on LinkedIn is powered by a combination of:

- network analysis (you know A, B, and C. they all know D. you may know D.)

- mining data from your mobile address book (you have A in your contacts, A has you in their contacts, you may know A.)

The recommendation likely occurred as a result of you and the provider adding each other as a contact in a contacts app each of you have authorized LinkedIn to access.

[gatorcode]

This is exactly it. LinkedIn harasses you to turn this on every time you launch the app on your mobile. If you have their number in your contact list and you enabled this setting.

I don’t know about Android, but in iOS you can see if you have enabled access to contacts. It’s also totally feasible your contact info is in their phone and they enabled it (email address).