It'll only take 24 hours they said... It'll be fine they said... the lie detecter test determined... that was a lie.
Who am I? I'm Nicole, a 22 year old youtuber, makeup artist and small business owner. How did I get locked out of Facebook? I don't know but here are my best guesses: Facebook didn't like my Buzzfeed thanksgiving quiz from last year or someone who doesn't like me reported me as abuse or there were too many people in my pic collage...
.. and the list goes on.
I know what you're saying.. why are you writing this? Can't you just fix it?
Well friend, here's the point of the ranty (diary) post.... you can't. And here's a (probably over) detailed account of the past 24 hours.
When you sign up for Facebook everything seems great- it's a prime place to connect with professional and personal contacts as well as a place to watch videos of puppies swimming in a pool and a place to post your overly PDA New Year's Eve pictures. The security measures look amazing when you sign up- until you're locked out.
You can be randomly scrolling and be reconnected to a log in page and then it happens, you're locked out. You sit around for hours and hours retyping in your password and identifying friends' faces (thanks for the pictures of my ex-boyfriend Facebook, that's what I wanted to see) and typing in codes sent to your phone but nothing happens or you get a 500 error. You're then redirected to the "help center" which shows you a page for "phishing" but I can assure you I was not "phished" nor did I "phish" anyone. After scrolling for hours through pages and googling contact information for Facebook you'll come to a realization.... Facebook has no live support team or contact email.
So then you take to the internet to see if other people have had the same issue and to your absolute horror you see you're not alone.
Twitter searching "Facebook locked out" is your absolute worst nightmare. I managed to come in contact with Aaron Elya (@DiscJockeyEtc), who had a similar problem. In an email to me, Elya explained, "I was locked out of my Facebook sometime on Thanksgiving afternoon... 100% of my advertising budget goes to Facebook... I also rely on Facebook to communicate with current and potential clients. In fact, I'm waiting on a response back from a potential client right now but I have no way of knowing if they've gotten back to me or not. This is unacceptable". Another tweet said a different guy had been locked out for three years. Three. Years. Can you say horrified?
Attempting to log into Buzzfeed, I realized that everything I've ever used Facebook to log in for (Buzzfeed, Tinder, various stores and apps) are now completely frozen since my Facebook is too. (HOW WILL I SWIPE RIGHT NOW MARK ZUCKERBERG... HOW??)
But the worst? I rely on Facebook to interact with my customers... and what weekend is it? Black Friday/ Small Business Saturday/ Cyber Monday. If you hold any small business close to your heart then you know how this feels. (It feels like being invited to a pizza party and someone is eating a pizza in front of you and smacks your hand every time you try to eat a slice.)
So now I'm hour 27 of being locked out with no explanation... no email, no social media responses, no nothing.
Scroll through any of Facebook's social media and you'll see the same compliant of being locked out over and over and over.. and Facebook, like Kylie and her lips, plead the fifth and don't say a word.
Have you had a similar experience being locked out? Tell your story in the comments below and let's bond over being locked out.
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