Today was day 2 of my "email Facebook daily asking for my account to be reinstated" plan. And this afternoon I convinced my husband to start a Facebook group called "Reinstate Amanda ______ _________'s Facebook Page!" in order to try to gather support for my cause. Astonishingly, Eric's little group, sort of a joke, had 30 members only a few hours later, some of whom are people who don't even know me! It was silly, but it made me feel loved.
So, maybe the mental energy worked because... I'm back on Facebook! I hestitantly logged on and am sure that at least a day or two will pass before I lose the fear that my every keystroke is being monitored somewhere in the world by a person planning to steal my identity.
To conclude my series of blogs about my Facebook adventure, here are a few things I've learned over the past few days:
1) Apparently Facebook has a bad reputation for disabling accounts without any explanation, and some of the time those accounts are never reestablished. Something to keep in mind when you start thinking of Facebook as an eternal keeper of photographs, memories, email addresses or important correspondence.
2) Facebook *may* bend to peer pressure. All I know is that I sent 2 emails yesterday and 1 today and have a tiny group of vocal supporters on Facebook and I am back, while a google search using the words "facebook", "account" and "disabled" shows many many cases that didn't resolve nearly as quickly. Just sayin'...
3) For a "big" social networking site, there are some pretty stupid problems they have that are readily apparent to an outsider. The first being the lack of even a standard email indicating they are taking action related to an account. The second, which I just learned, is this (and I'm kind of shocked by this one): Once you set up a security question and answer on Facebook, you can't change your question or the answer! Seems strange. I hurredly created a security question post-hack and, in fact, the answer I created for the question isn't even factually correct - luckily I remember what I picked as my answer! - and now that I have access to my account again, I thought I would again change my password and security question just to be safe. And I just read in the "help" section (again, not so helpful) that if a security question is established, it can't be changed.
4) View your Facebook page from the eye of a thief. Example: If your security question is "What is your mother's maiden name?" it isn't a good idea to have your mother's facebook page that includes her maiden name linked to your account under "relationships". Also not a good idea to make public your entire birthdate with year. I have already gone through and weeded out info that may be used by a hacker to access other sources.
Alright, time to let go of this Facebook stress for the night! Goodnight everybody!
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