OneGuyFromBarlick

Stanley wrote: ↑23 Aug 2023, 01:49 I hope your problem heals up.

I don't think that is an option Stanley. Checked last night and the site is now reporting two admins, both based in Indonesia! As I can only access with my normal FB profile I cant see any further details. There doesn't seem to be any other changes apart from denied access. From what I have read, a give-away can be a change of the registered email address but that is OK.

Very frustrating, we have events to publicise and the messaging via the site is used by folk who want to contact the group.

Originator of the group got back to me today and he doesn't have access either.

I have made an appeal for help to a Facebook email address I found for disabled accounts. Sent all the details and credentials etc. Waiting with baited breath.

Can you "freeze out" then rid yourselves of the Indonesian intruders by changing the password - then just telling it to the bona fides?

Or is that too simplistic?

You need to have access to the group with admin permissions to change the password and that is the crux of the matter, no one has access. We still have control of the email address registered with the site but changing that password wont return access to the group.

I guessed as much. . . .

You may find this helpful eventually

"The word “Keparat” is equivalent to swear word “Bangsat” “Anjing” and “Monyet”. In English, it is equivalent to an expression “SOB” and “sc*mbag.” It is used to direct your hatred or despise towards someone. An example: “Keparat, lu bohong ke gue,” which more or less translates to “SOB, you lied to me” in English.17 Jan 2020"

Good luck - I'm sure you will find an answer.

It sounds to me like a denial of service scam but you haven't mentioned anyone asking for money. It seems to me that there must be a reason for it and money making is always the favourite.....
Sorry you are having the problem. Only consolation is that there must be thousands of good brains affected and working on this.....

No reply to my email or even an acknowledgement of receipt. From what I read this could be par for the course, Facebook help can be a lot of going round in circles with no actual solution offered. A bit like my Talk Talk problem. I am under attack!

Is there any way of communicating directly with Meta? They probably have no idea this is happening. They should be concerned, it's bad for business.

Stanley wrote: ↑25 Aug 2023, 02:19 Is there any way of communicating directly with Meta? T

Not that I have found and that's the problem. It took a while to find an email address. It's all self help and try this and try that with no next step if the offered solutions don't work. A perfect example of dodging the bullet.

If push comes to shove we can just start another group. But it's a bit like an email address, the group has 14 years of history of events and photographs of supporters and the like. We would have to abandon all of that. Much better to recover if possible.

Are others facing the same problem?

A simple Google search for Facebook support will reveal a sorry state of affairs. It's a problem with no apparent solution other than clutching at straws.

No reply to my email yet.

We will probably have to bite the bullet an ditch 14 years of history on the site and start again. There would still be a problem though of disabling the existing one, we don't want two live sites with one permanently non accessible by admin.

PanBiker wrote: ↑26 Aug 2023, 09:18 There would still be a problem though of disabling the existing one, we don't want two live sites with one permanently non accessible by admin.

That's a tough one indeed. Do the Indonesians have access and presumably control of the current site? How did they get into it at all? What can be their motivation for causing all this chaos? It sounds as if Facebook (META) have become to big to care about an individual's problems.

Our group page shows 2 anonymous admins in Indonesia. Another group page that was started by Gus for old a new Barlick photos has also gone the same way, he has no access and that one shows 1 anonymous admin in Indonesia. It is linked by virtue of Gus setting the Bosom Friends website address as generic.

They haven't actually done anything apart from deleting all the admins on both groups, effectively rendering them useless. A bit like a DOS attack on other websites.

Sounds like it's Gus's personal Facebook page is the source of the 'hack' then (presuming it had admin rights to the group). Facebook help looks to have a one to two week turnaround for 'hacking' queries, sounds like they get a lot of it...

Would it help if other people reported the page Ian?

Unless you report from the group page Facebook defaults to your own Facebook profile which is why it is so difficult to report group problems. If you are not careful you can end up reporting your own page.

It sounds like a proper can of worms. I think David's comment is about right....
" It sounds as if Facebook (META) have become to big to care about an individual's problems."
He also asked a question that intrigues me, 'what's the motive?' At the moment it simply seems to be delight in mischief.......
A puzzle....

They are certainly wired up differently when they take down a cancer support network group. I find it hard to believe that they can't understand English.

Did you get this sorted out Ian?

In a word no.

Facebook or Meta support is non existent. I spent hours looking for routes of support to no avail apart from an email address which I contacted. I have not even had a confirmation, automatic or human made.

Reading other folks woes, our experience is par for the course. With no admin access you are stuffed.

So, taking all that on board we have decided to abandon the page and appeal to our 1.7K followers to unfollow and block the page. We have put posts up onto all the Trustees Facebook sites and local Facebook Groups to that effect. We will eventually put another page up as a replacement.

Sad, the page has been going for 13 years and was used by many for contact to the group. That may still be happening but we have no way of accessing the messaging via the site either. It has 13 years of the groups photos, fund raising efforts, comments etc, can't recover any of that without admin access.

I have blocked the old site, these hackers have a lot to answer for

I should add that we now apparently have 6 Indonesian admins.

That's a terrible outcome and yes, the Indonesian gangs are culpable but so is Meta. They are happy to take the advertising revenue from Facebook but not willing to take any responsibility. The question I'd be asking is "Do we need Meta?"

Fortunately there are no bank accounts tied to the page for advertising revenue or donations or anything like that. As a charity page though who knows what the intention was (is)?

A friend has commented on one of our posts that the company he works for had their page hacked and because they had advertising linked, (because it was a commercial page) they lost £14,000. Their bank gave it them back when the hack was verified. Interestingly he said that the firms tech team managed to recover the page but it was a complicated procedure. He is going to ask them what the process was for recovery and let us know.

We would much rather recover the page if we can, We can re-brand it with our new logo's etc and engage two factor authentication if we can get on.

When I posted the appeal to block on my Facebook page last night. I didn't tag the Bosoms Page before I posted. Literally within seconds I had multiple offers of chargeable recovery services, all probably from auto servers. I had to delete the post and do it again. As I had been hit instantaneously with crap. I decided to change the password on MY FB account and engage two factor authentication. Better safe than sorry or at least make it as hard as possible to hack.

It says something that a charity like yours can be treated like this. I think I'm allowed to say that I hope the bastards who did this rot in hell.