I received the following e-mail from Facebook (xxxxxxxxxx@support.facebook.com) on August 27.
Your account has been temporarily suspended for security purposes. Our systems indicate that your Facebook account has been compromised by cybercriminals attempting to impersonate you. These criminals often will try to trick your friends into sending them money by claiming that you are stuck in a far away location and need assistance. It is likely that your email account was compromised as well. As such, we have sent this email to all email accounts recently associated with your account. Obtaining access to a victim's email is one of the primary ways these cybercriminals have been operating. Please take the following steps to regain control of your account:
1. Password Reset: Select new and unique passwords for all of your email addresses. Do not use the same password for different online accounts as this allows hackers to easily gain access to your other accounts, such as Facebook, once one account has been compromised.
2. Email Preferences: Check the Preferences/Settings of your email account to make sure the scammer did not add any unauthorized forwarding rules to your email. This is becoming a common practice for scammers to use, so it is important that you complete this extra step. If you need further assistance with this, please contact your email provider.
3. Once you have secured your email account, respond to this email with the answer to your security question:
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx?
Please closely follow the instructions provided in this email to ensure the future safety and security of your Facebook account..
Visit the Help Center for more information: "Where can I find more information about money transfer scams?"
http://www.facebook.com/help/?faq=16148
I verified that my account is truly disabled. If I try to login, I am told my account is disabled. If I try to visit my public page at
http://www.facebook.com/michael.burns, "Page Not Found" is displayed.
The help link provided results in the error:
There was a problem reaching the FAQ you requested.
There is a link provided to an FAQ entry (
here) when I try to login it. That FAQ entry states that if I "would like to regain access" to my account, I am to contact them at this link:
https://ssl.facebook.com/help/contact.php?show_form=security_disabled_419.
I have completed that form twice now, once on August 27 and once on August 29. The form results in an e-mail similar to the first one. I have responded to both of those e-mails as instructed.
I am still unable to access my account!
And, I have not heard anything from Facebook!
This is a very poor way to handle security issues. Yes, it is the most secure. But, it is also the most
user-unfriendly.
A security issue should result in me having to verify my identity and then changing my password on the account. And, it should be done quickly!
I will keep you updated!
