Facebook scammers keep hijacking my friends pages and using them to scam other people. Reporting it to Facebook doesn’t seem to do anything. They will sometimes take down individual posts, but they will not shut down the account or restore it to the original owner. Is there anyone who has experience with Facebook scammers? Is there anything I can do?
Some of this, you might already know, so please dont feel like I’m doubting your knowledge of the stuff.
Are your friends’ pages being cloned, or hacked? Those are two different things. In cloning, the scammer creates a duplicate of the account, generally for the purpose of sending friend requests and then maybe scam messages about needing money, etc. Sometimes they might change the account name just a little, to make it harder for the cloned party to find and report, but only enough that most people receiving a friend request wouldn’t notice it’s not from who they think sent it.
The best way around cloning is for the person who got cloned and as many others as possible to report the fake account to FB, under “pretending to be someone.” (The three little dots under the cover photo on the fake account, right side of the page.) Some cloners steal the victim’s photos to make the cloned page look more authentic, so photos should be set so only friends can see them. (Cover and profile pics are by default public.) But the big thing for cloners is the victim’s Friends List, so it should be set to private. Changing their password won’t help with a cloned account, because a whole new account has been created.
Now, if the victim ever replied to one of those “OMG is this you in the video” or “Look who died” private messages, they’ve probably been hacked. There’s no video or obituary to see, but entering login details gives the hacker the victim’s username and password. Then the hacker can get into the vic’s account at will.
The victim can go into their settings, see if anyone is logged in from a strange location, and boot them off. I don’t have the exact procedure memorized. but it can be found online, at FB Help and maybe elsewhere. I’ve given someone a link on how to do it, and it worked. They were surprised to find someone in a faraway place logged in as them, Then the person who got hacked should change to a strong new password. (And not respond to any more PMs that appear to be from friends, but are really from the hacker who got their friend’s login info. It’s like the Crona; it can spread,)
Hoping this helps. Some folks just won’t make their accounts secure, no matter how many times you drop hints, but do what you can.
[Edited for many typos, 03:48 EDT. 
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Thanks. These are definitely full takeovers. The account that was theirs is now controlled by a scammer who is now endlessly posting “cash giveaways” and “financial blessings” posts. I don’t know what happens when you contact FB about that, but whatever it is, it’s not effective. In every case, my friend just had to start a new account, or leaving the platform entirely. The old page is still there, connected to all their friends and trying to scam them. I am going to try to bait this guy and see if i can get him to say something actionable, but i am new at this.
I was able to successfully bait him for about 6 hours and get two Zelle accounts. One email and one phone number. Email is useless. Don’t know if the phone number is a scammer or a mule. Reported both to Zelle, even though the language on their website does not inspire confidence. Not too bad for my first time right?