Geoff Edwards considered himself a sophisticated internet user, but now he considers himself a cautionary tale.
Hackers, he鈥檚 recently discovered, are capable of fooling anyone. He learned that lesson the hard way when he lost his Facebook account, and now he鈥檚 warning others.
It can happen to you too.
鈥淣one of us realize what shaky ground we stand on with this platform,鈥� Edwards said. 鈥淪omebody can send you an email and you can make one wrong move and your whole Facebook world comes crashing down.鈥�
For Edwards, who鈥檚 been on Facebook since 2009, the nightmare started May 28, 2022.
He woke up to a notification email, telling him someone had accessed his Facebook account at 3:46 a.m. that morning, using a different device than his tablet. The email asked him to verify that it was him.
It looked totally legit, so Edwards clicked through all the procedures to prove his identity and secure his account.
鈥淭hey send a code to your phone, you enter that code at the website and you鈥檙e back on Facebook again,鈥� he said. 鈥淚 carried on with my day and when I came back in later that day I had Facebook advising me that my videos were ready to view.
鈥淎nd I thought to myself, 鈥榃hat videos?鈥欌��
This email had links to 17 of them, all uploaded within two minutes of each other.
Edwards didn鈥檛 dare click on any of the links, but next thing he knew he was looking at another email, with Facebook saying his account was suspended, he鈥檇 breached community standards and he had 30 days to dispute it.
The problem at that point was, there was no way to dispute it. He couldn鈥檛 find any humans to talk to, only unhelpful links.
鈥淓ach link I tried sent me to that Facebook screen saying my account was suspended and I had 30 days to respond,鈥� Edwards said. 鈥淚 did find one link to people who are concerned about data breaches through Facebook. I wrote an email and actually got a human being who told me it wasn鈥檛 their department and they couldn鈥檛 help me.
鈥淪omewhere in there was a phone number in California to try, but no one answers. It鈥檚 just a voice recording.鈥�
As if that鈥檚 not bad enough, Edwards also got hit in the pocketbook.
He had a long-dormant PayPal account, still attached to Facebook and linked to his bank account. Whoever hacked his account bought Facebook advertising and he was tagged for $328.
鈥淭hey didn鈥檛 get my credit card information, because that expired, otherwise they could have drained that account too,鈥� Edwards said. 鈥淎s it is, I鈥檝e had to go through a bunch of business with my bank and register with Western Union and Equifax and that sort of thing, in case they try to do anything else.鈥�
Edwards is far from the only person to be fooled by phishing emails, although he still struggles to understand what exactly triggered the hack.
鈥淚鈥檝e looked at the emails over and over and I still can鈥檛 tell which one might be a phishing email,鈥� he said.
But a Google search using terms like Facebook hack or suspended will produce similar tales.
When he went to the RCMP to open a file after discovering the bank fraud, he said to an officer, 鈥淚 can鈥檛 believe they got me.鈥�
鈥淎nd his response was, 鈥楧on鈥檛 kick yourself too hard about it. They鈥檙e professionals and they have a knack for making things look almost identical to a message from Facebook.鈥�
In most cases, there鈥檚 no happy ending to this scenario. Once a Facebook account is compromised, there鈥檚 no getting it back.
For Edwards, an actor and audio/video content producer (streamworks.ca and geoffedwards.media), the lost account means lost contacts. There are 600 or so people he鈥檚 connected with over the years. Those contacts are gone. He鈥檚 thankful to still have his Twitter handle (@geoffedwards) with 1,100-plus followers, but Facebook appears to be a total writeoff.
鈥淎t this point I鈥檇 have to create a whole new identify on Facebook, and I don鈥檛 know if I want to,鈥� he said. 鈥淏ut if I were back on Facebook today I鈥檇 tell people on there to nail down their account, be very cautious about what they click on and don鈥檛 depend on Facebook alone for your social media presence.
鈥淏eing on Facebook is a necessary evil these days because that鈥檚 where you connect with your customers and your community, and that鈥檚 where employers go to find out about you, but you need to be hyper-alert with any e-mails claiming to be from Facebook, or any social media platform for that matter.鈥�
eric.welsh@hopestandard.com
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