SOCIAL MEDIA SAFETY TIPS
To Our Dear Friends,
We owe you an apology. On Saturday, August 1st, our Facebook page was hacked and hijacked. During this time, we lost control of our page, and a third party posted a great deal of problematic content while posing as Mark Schneider. We are sincerely and profoundly sorry that this happened, and apologize for any distress you may have experienced.
Here’s What Happened
At this point, we are not certain who the hijacker is, or how they gained control of our page. What we do know is that we became aware of the situation almost immediately, but ran into significant difficulties getting any help from Facebook to remedy the situation.
While Facebook has easily accessible protocols in place to recover a hacked profile, no such supports exist for business pages. It took days of research and outreach until we found someone who could help us at Facebook. That was the first step in a multi-part process that at long last gave us back control of our page.
Here’s What We Learned
We can never take security for granted. Even if you think no one would ever bother your Facebook Business Page in a million years, you still need to take steps to protect yourself. Here’s what you need to know:
- Make sure your Facebook account has 2-step verification on the account tied to a cell phone. This will cut down on being hacked, without causing the legitimate account owner any inconvenience.
- Make sure your Facebook account is tied to an email that is monitored every day even on the weekends. An email distribution list is great for social media so multiple team members receive the email and it is not an individual mailbox.
- Install the Facebook Pages App on your smart phone and turn on push notifications to see messages and stay up to date on customer notifications.
Thank You for Your Patience & Understanding
We were really touched by the numbers of you who reached out to us through any means you could find, including visiting us at the store and making long distance phone calls, to let us know something was wrong with our Facebook page. We very much appreciate your support and concern. Please know that we’ll be doing our very best to make sure this never happens again, and that our Facebook page remains the place you can trust for information on the newest Mark Schneider designs and promotions.
