How Do I Regain Access to My Hacked Facebook Account?
No need to say “log out of Facebook” in the comments to this. For those on social media – and there seems to be a lot of you, given that the company’s total active user base is not completely falling – there is a lot you can and should do to protect your account. However, if someone is invading your digital kingdom, it can be a real headache to regain your online image, if you can at all.
Lifehacker reader Tim shares the dark news in an interview with Tech 911 this week:
“What can you do if your Facebook account has been hacked? My husband’s account has been hacked. The email address, password, and phone numbers for the account have been changed, so it cannot use any of the Help Center recovery options. I reported this account, but there was no response. “
Turn to Facebook tools and start annoying
I sympathize with you, Tim, and I have read many stories about people caught in this exact situation. An attacker logs into someone’s account, modifies all information, perhaps even switches two-factor authentication to their devices, and essentially pulls someone out of Facebook users. Regarding the return, I am also sad to report that I have not read many success stories on this front.
This is not to say that this is an impossible task, just incredible. Let’s take a look at a few possible solutions you can try.
In the past, you could get your friends to report a hacked Facebook account, but that option seems to be gone. Instead, Facebook added a Hacked Accounts section to its Help Center. Visit this website and you will be able to use a guided tool that will offer you a variety of prompts from which you can choose. You can also visit this website to try to regain access to your account. (I would try both if one gives better results than the other. Heck, you could even try this page .)
In theory, your husband should be able to use any of the tools to get back into his account, although this process may eventually require him to provide physical verification of his identity to Facebook. And honestly, it’s good if you get to this step, because it’s probably the best chance to regain access.
I also want your husband to check his email address for Facebook notifications about email / password changes. You should receive an email to the previous address whenever a new address is added to your account. As Facebook points out:
“If the email address associated with your Facebook account has changed, you can cancel it. When you change your email address, we send a message to your previous email account with a dedicated link. You can click this link to undo the change to your email address and protect your account. “
Facebook tools should allow you to reset the email address and / or phone number associated with your account. If you are asked to provide a login code because someone set up two-factor authentication for your stolen account, make sure you select any of the available “help me” options instead of running that code on someone else’s device. This should ultimately lead you to a mechanism that you will need to use to prove to Facebook that you really are you, but there is no guarantee that restoring access to your account will be a quick process .
Going forward, make sure your husband has set up two-factor authentication on his Facebook account – regardless of whether he gains access to his existing account or gives it up and creates a new one. Thus, it will be nearly impossible for someone to hack into his account unless they have physical access to his smartphone or if they do not perform some kind of SIM tampering attack. And, as always, it is very important to use a unique strong password for Facebook that is not shared with any other service. Ideally one that will be kept safe with a dedicated password manager .
I wish I could give you the best advice or even a way to contact Facebook to get personal help solving the problem. Unfortunately, Facebook’s automated tools are the best you can get. Make sure it has completely exhausted all possibilities, even if you have to go through them several times, clicking on all the various “help me” links along the way. He may even have to pester Facebook elsewhere. (Direct messages to Twitter? Maybe even Oculus support if he pretends to be a client who needs access to his Facebook account to use it) or sends his ID multiple times (along with increasingly caustic comments) before he regains access to your account.
Is it annoying? A hundred times yes. However, persistence will (hopefully) pay off.