June IWSG: Idle Hands

You know the saying: idle hands are the devil's playground. It seems idle platforms are the playgrounds of devilish hackers. My sadly neglected Facebook author page was hijacked by hackers who turned my verified (the accounts with the blue checks...the ones Facebook verifies as authentic) author account into a clothing store. They renamed Elizabeth Seckman, Author to simply Seckman. 

My kids were the first to notice and messaged me bright and early asking me if I thought I was Madonna.  

No, I'm no Madonna, but the ensuing back and forth with my virtual intruders was a real mother. They would remove me as admin. I'd petition Facebook for my rights back so I could remove them. They'd be gone for about an hour and then they'd be back. 

It was time consuming and frustrating. 

 I changed my account password and email passwords about twenty times an hour. Nothing helped. The hackers kept adding admins faster than I could delete them. Facebook was zero help, so I called my niece who is professionally computer savvy. She combed through the account and decided the hacker wasn't getting access through my email or Facebook account. Her guess was that they were granted access to the page by Facebook by petitioning for ownership of an idle page.  

I filed a copyright complaint with Facebook and they informed me that if I wanted to follow through with the complaint, they'd have to delete my page entirely. That stunk because that meant starting over. I didn't want to start over, but I also didn't want my verified status used to scam unsuspecting users. Someone sees a blue check and they assume the page is legit. 

At least that's what I assume they wanted the page for. They wanted a  "legit" page to do "business" from. 

Facebook did send me a notice that I was removed as admin of my own page. 

I don't know any of the people who hijacked my page, but sadly they were more active than I was.   

That has always been an insecurity- how does one manage to do everything? Plenty of people do it, so I know it can be done. I've been years trying to find the right balance between writing/marketing/laundry. 

So, now I'm starting over. I'm trying to look at it as a fresh start and not the royal pain in my arse that it was. If you have a sec, would you give me a like? I have a long way to go to get back to where I was... 

Elizabeth Seckman, Author Part 2

Thanks IWSG! And thanks to our leader, Alex Cavanaugh and our awesome co-hosts J Lenni Dorner, Sarah Foster, Natalie Aguirre, Lee Lowery, and Rachna Chhabria!