Our Mu Shin Martial Culture Facebook Page Got Hacked: Here’s What Happened and How We’re Coping

Introduction

Our Facebook company page has always been a crucial platform for connecting with the public, sharing updates, and promoting our work. Recently, we faced a significant challenge when our page was hacked, causing major disruptions.

Discovery of the Hack

It all started on a Wednesday afternoon. I had just finished taking my childhood friend who was visiting Beijing to the Forbidden City. I wanted to share some photos with the public of the magnificence of the location, as I did the day before after we visited the Temple of Heaven. But to my surprise, I didn’t see the “Mu Shin Martial Culture” profile to switch to and when I went to the page, it was as if I was a regular member of the public as opposed to the page owner. I thought to myself, “Has my page been hacked?” Unfortunately, the answer was YES.

Immediate Actions Taken

Upon discovering the hack, we immediately changed our Facebook passwords and confirmed that two-factor authentication was enabled. We reported the issue to Facebook on the 5th of June through Meta business as they have no avenues to report security breaches directly, which is a major problem with Facebook. Nonetheless, they assured us it would be dealt with within 48 hours. However, despite their promise, no progress has been made, and we have received no updates even five days later. Keep in mind that I have two-factor authentication enabled on all my social media avenues including Facebook and have so for years.

Communication with Facebook

Dealing with Facebook support has been incredibly frustrating. There is no direct communication avenue to contact Facebook security. The only support available is through meta business advertising agents, who have little to no help to offer on our case. Despite our continuous efforts and multiple rounds of verification, our page remains compromised.

Impact of the Hack

Initially, for a few hours, the hackers didn’t do anything on my page. However, a few hours later they started posting spam wildlife videos. Now, don’t get me wrong, I enjoy the odd video of animals, but not on my page. The hack has had several negative impacts. The hackers are still fully utilizing the page, making dozens of spam posts every day, all the while using our company name and details and pretending to be “Mu Shin Martial Culture”. This has severely damaged our brand’s reputation as our followers are getting constantly spammed with these nonsense posts multiple times a day and I am sure that a number of followers would naturally stop following the page. Bear in mind that the page took 3+ years to grow to this level and it is all being washed down the drain due to Facebook’s incompetence and irresponsibility.

Current Situation

As of now, we are still in the process of trying to recover our Facebook page. Despite having two-factor authentication enabled on our profile, the hackers seemed to bypass it. Today, Facebook responded regarding the initial report I filed about the hacked site and the response was ASTOUNDING! They also closed the case as “Resolved” - They simply stated the following:

Limited support for this type of issue?!?!?!! Limited support for hacking and identity theft, as well as false representation and fraud?? What kind of admission is that??? Of course I had filled out the report form already on day one, and there was no reference to it in the inbox mentioned.

Naturally, I cannot leave this situation as is and I have once again opened a case, however, reading hundreds of horror stories online about similar situations and looking at how Facebook dealt with my initial report, I am not confident they will resolve this. In other words, Facebook, due to its utter incompetence, is enabling hackers and other criminals to do whatever they please, often causing financial, emotional and reputational damage to people.

Facebook's Incompetence and Negligence

Those of you who have followed the Mu Shin Martial Culture Facebook page can see for yourselves what is being posted there. It would be evident to anyone with a double digit IQ and eyes in their head that the page has been hacked and taken over, yet Facebook, following and investigation (most likely conducted my Mr. Magoo) has failed to identify this…

This ordeal has made it very clear that Facebook is woefully incompetent and unable to keep public users safe. The company does not allocate sufficient resources to the issue of security and retrieval, and deliberately has no avenue to deal with such important issues, displaying their overt negligence. This experience has highlighted the fact that Facebook cannot and should not be trusted in any capacity, whether for personal, promotional or business operations. It is rife with hackers who can steal your page after years of hard work with no recourse, and worse, damage the credibility of your company. Worse, Facebook doesn’t seem to care at all or take this seriously.

This case shows that Facebook is, in fact, a danger to any entity that decides to use it, enabling hackers and criminals to operate with impunity. In my opinion, Facebook needs to have action taken against it on governmental levels as it is now a public security threat.

Lessons Learned

This experience has taught us valuable lessons about the reality of digital giants such as Facebook:

Establish your own main public social promotion avenues outside of these mega-social platforms instead of relying on FB, Insta etc.
Always enable two-factor authentication, although it may not be foolproof.
Regularly review and update security settings.
Monitor your page frequently for any unusual activity.
Educate your team about the importance of cybersecurity.
Be prepared for the possibility of inadequate support from the platform and where possible avoid using them in any official capacity. (read - Don’t connect any financial instruments to Facebook in any shape at all)

What We Are Doing

While I am still trying to recover the page from Facebook, we need to prepare for the reality that the current Mu Shin Martial Culture page will never be recovered. To that end, I will in the coming days start to create a new one. But, I hope our followers can slowly gravitate to our other avenues to stay informed of our work and news etc., such as the official Mu Shin Martial Culture website and by subscribing to our newsletter on it. I will be focusing on posting news and updates to the relevant sections of the website, including the newly created blog section as our primary avenue for information dissemination.

I am also hoping that I get faced off against Mark Zuckerberg in a martial arts event at some point in the future…

Big Trouble in Little Facebook