He Doesn’t Like You and She’s NOT Your Friend: FB Scammers Hit Hard

Social media has been a wonderful resource and equally bad as a time stealer – and identity stealer as well. We here at Everything South City continue to put the word out about scams impacting our neighbors, both online and in real life.

This latest scam trend has made victims even out of the most aware and cautious internet users and we’ve been asked by a few of them to share this with our readers. Below is one person’s account of what happened which echoes the other warnings we have received.

“I was on Facebook and typing with someone I ‘knew’ was a friend…  Lee’s sister in law Mora.  I was asking how she was really doing since she fell. She said hey, I can use my messenger, but I can’t get back into my account, can you help me?  She said give me your cell and they will send you a code to get me back in.  Well, this person was NOT my friend and they were using the code on MY cell to take over my account and it was done in minutes.”

Our neighbor, who even has a background in law, realized too late, this was a scam. But FB and social media in general, can be confusing when they change formats and accesses regularly. One instance, for those who have designated someone to take over their FB should they die, the ‘legacy contact’ does involve having a code sent to them, so this other instance might have felt acceptable. But it wasn’t.

“I kept receiving email alerts from FB asking if I changed my password?  Did I change my phone number? Over and over again they asked.  I kept replying NO!! But even FB couldn’t stop this.  And I am wondering if there really is any hope that I’ll ever be able to get that account back.”

With more and more AI interceding on daily tasks, it is so frustrating that a live person is never available to help sort out these types of issues. And the scams are happening more and more frequent.

“The hacker will need to lighten up their guard yet they are still very much active trying to get my friends.  My page won’t even allow a friend to post a I’VE BEEN HACKED and am not in control of this account message.  These hackers are pros!”

And that is the sad part of this- many of us have spent years creating our online life, with contacts, pictures, memories – that can be wiped out in just like that. Even those who are seasoned pros and know better, can be hacked in an instant. It happens, sadly.

“I realized pretty quickly that I had been duped and tried to stop it as fast as I could, but they beat me every second.  How stupid.” our neighbor laments. “Today is another day.  I spent yesterday setting up new email accounts…  getting it to work on my phone, all sorts of security updates, etc.  It was awful.”

Another reader said they also had set up a new FB account yet could not reach out to their real-life friends because FB wouldn’t allow the friend request to go to people they didn’t know or share mutual acquaintances.

Everything South City does continue outreach via FB, IG, ND yet we strongly encourage our readers to sign up for our weekly digest to ensure they do not miss local happenings should they get hacked and no longer have access to such information. (*ESC never sells or gives you your contact or any of your information – we’re neighbors!)

(*ESC never sells or shares your contact information – we’re neighbors!)

Bottom line, be sure to keep copies of your photos and your friends contact information off of social media.  But our photos and memories and personal contacts now belong to someone else – including what we thought were our private messages. And remember, whatever you do on the internet just might be made public via a hacker.

Has this same scheme impacted you or anyone you know?

What did you do to get your account back?

And what do you think is being done with the personal information?

Share your ideas with us all!