Two Months Later, Facebook Responds To Help Request

As many of you know, way back in February, I had my Facebook account hijacked. I reported the hijacking almost as soon as it occurred and had several of my friends also report it so that the issue could be resolved more quickly. However, it was still several days before Facebook help replied, and weeks went by before my account was finally restored.

Now it is April, and I was surprised to receive the following note in response to my original request for aid:

Hi,

We apologize for our delayed response to your inquiry. Unfortunately, we will not be able to answer the ticket you have submitted. We have recently made improvements to our Help Center to better assist people with problems like the one you are experiencing. If you have not been able to resolve this issue, please visit the Security section of the Help Center and submit a new ticket using the appropriate contact form. To assist us in diagnosing your issue, please carefully review each of the options in the Help Center and select the contact form that best describes your situation:

http://www.facebook.com/help.php

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. Thanks,

The Facebook Team

It's an odd message, especially considering that it comes to me:

• Two months after I reported the issue
• After they fixed my problem

I can only conclude, as have many others, that Facebook lives in its own special bubble. Within that bubble, there is an alternative universe known as the Help Center. Lord only knows what standards of reality prevail there.

For further amusement, you can read about what happens when the Help Center advises the Customer Service department and Product Development teams in Lisa Barone's excellent post:

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• Dear Facebook, WTF Are You Doing Now? (outspokenmedia.com)

An Update On The Facebook Hijacking

Several people have asked about the Facebook situation, and I am sorry to report that there is no progress on that front. The staff at Facebook have been absolutely unhelpful in terms of getting my account back. It has been two weeks since I first reported the account being stolen, and I've followed up twice with no results.

I know that several friends also reported the account as hijacked, and I want to express my gratitude to each one of you who did that. I feel supported, even if the Facebook security team isn't taking action there either.

I may see about other options with Facebook this week, but I'm quite turned off by their lack of response to the security breach. I'm also quite mystified that they can be promoting themselves as a business platform if this is the kind of response time they offer for security issues!

Internet Hijacking

It seems my email and facebook accounts were compromised. I've recovered the email, but facebook is a really pain to get assistance from for this kind of thing. I'm so sorry! Working on it!