Before you laugh, after reading that comment, and say, “How funny! The Gray Haired Tech has been hacked!” Let us stop and talk about this for a few minutes.
I have seen this message or many like it many times over the years, from my readers and I finally got a few questions about it. Very likely something has not hacked your account or gotten your password.
People assume that when their friends get requests to “Friend” them on Facebook again (or any of many other Social Media sites) that their account has been hacked. They are panicky as their very intricate and hard to crack password (hopefully strong, complicated, and a difficult password) has been discovered or uncovered by someone on the internet. Now their account is being “taken over” by this nefarious evildoer.
Well, this is highly unlikely. Should you panic? Most likely not. Should you send out an email to all your friends telling them your “account has been hijacked?” Maybe, but change the message to your friends a bit.
This is usually the deal. You most likely have not been hijacked when your friends get this request to re-friend them. Think about it, they are already your friend on this account. Why would you need to have them re-friend you or you them…you are already friends on that account so they should never receive that request or vice-versa.
You have been Impersonated or duplicated, but your own account is ok. How?
Well, look at someone’s account, we will say Facebook, since that is the biggie. Scroll around look at some posts they have made, look at some of their personal photos, check out their friends. Easy? Sure it is or you would not be visiting them to often.
Now try this on any picture. Right click on it and select “Save image as” (in Google Chrome others may have different words). Once saved the nardo wells will do this and save a bunch of your photos. They will copy and paste or screenshot your comments and add some of those too. But they do it on a newly created account. They have put “You Name” on the platform to impersonate you but with a different email account. Bam! They are a poor imitation of you. They can even grab your major picture at the top of your account and add that. It looks like you, but other than them stealing your information, they are not you.
Your account really has nothing to worry about; however, your friends may, since they have not read this yet. The email message you send them from your actual account should just say someone is impersonating you and it is not your account, since you are already friends. They just sent your friends, by looking at your friends, an email, looking them up and sending them an additional request. They are usually trying to scam them to buy something “you love”, mess up the way people see you, or some other sort of sting operation.
Facebook (again, other social sites have something like this you can Google for) has a page telling you how to stop these creeps. Go to this site, ghtech.site/impersonate and follow Facebook’s instructions. Will it help, yes? Will it stop the evildoers, maybe? Will it help your friends, hopefully?
Good luck and I hope someone has not impersonated you on any social media sites. It is a real pain in the butt! (Ron’s words-not FB or any of the others.) Do not fret, it was not you and your friends should know you well enough to know what you will post. If they do not know you well enough, unfriend them on the social media account.
Be careful out there, my friends!
