I mean even you, dear reader, probably would be scratching your head if my blog encouraged you to sign up for a $50,000 government loan that you never have to pay back.
"That doesn't sound like Kristen." You might say.
Don't get me wrong. I would love to get my hands on some free cash and I certainly would try to pass on the good fortune to people I know, but...we all know there are a lot of scams out there and if it sounds too good to be true it probably is!
Let's go back a few days. Last Saturday, I was out and about wearing my reporter hat, when the first text came in. "Did you send me a message on Facebook?" "Nope," I replied to one of the moms in my kids' Tamburitzan group. I didn't really think anything of her message until I got home.
When I logged onto Facebook there was a post from my aunt. Did you send me a message? I responded right away. "Nope, it wasn't me." Then minutes later there was a voice mail on my phone. "Kristen, can you call me when you have a chance."
All the evidence pointed to the fact I had been hacked. Me - a part of a sneaky scheme to snooker people out of their personal information and get their cash. Wow, that definitely does not sound like me.
So right away my husband and I started our investigation. We were able to log in and see where and what devices I had used to access my account. That is where we noticed someone in Philadelphia had my been on my page two hours prior.
Weird, I thought. I had only been as far as Churchill that day and yet my footprint extended all the way to the land of cheesesteaks, Rocky and the Eagles.
There was nothing out of the ordinary on my page or in my messages, which was strange. I have a whole thread of past messages I have sent and nothing new popped up regarding anything about loans. The one friend, who I spoke with over the phone, said she and I (the imposter) were messaging back and forth but there was nothing indicating any prior Facebook chats we had had. (Usually when you message someone and you have done so before, the previous thread appears before you start typing your message.)
So I changed my password and I posted a message on Facebook alerting my friends I had been hacked, but everything had been taken care of. Hacking into a Facebook account is nothing new. How many times have you gotten a new friend request from someone you already thought you had friended? That usually happens after someone has been hacked. It happens all the time but I didn't think it would ever happen to me. I really do not comment or post photos regularly and I basically use the social media site to keep track of all the happenings in the Valley Mirror coverage area.
My husband asked if I had done something irregular lately using my account. I did share a photo that a friend had shared, although I was not familiar with the person who was the original source of the photo. I have decided that I will no longer be sharing information from people I do not know. This makes me a little sad because Facebook is a great way to get information out about something that is lost, an event that is happening or just a good article to read. But this hacking incident has me thinking about the safety of my information.
I did receive an email message from the Facebook team. Apparently, someone reported a profile (Gina L.) they thought was impersonating me. "We’ve reviewed the profile that your friend reported and found that it isn't pretending to be you and doesn't go against our Community Standards. If you think we should take another look, please reply to this message and let us know."
Ah, yeah. I think maybe you should take another look. I have not completely read Facebook's Community Standards policy, but I would think impersonating someone and trying to get personal information from their friends is not a standard you would want in your community. So it wasn't this Gina L. person who you investigated. Can you keep looking until you find out who it is before someone else is a victim and actually gives out their personal information to a person they think is their friend?
Well, I guess Mark Zuckerburg is going to be very busy today trying to get to the bottom of this, but in the meantime, next time you share a funny cat video, make sure you trust the source because if not, you might find yourself, unknowingly, trying to get your friends to sign up for a free cruise around the world and all they have to do is enter their debit card pin number.
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