Keep your conversations under your control
Messaging and social accounts connect you to people who trust you. A hijacked account can ask those contacts for emergency payments, harvest codes or publish scams under your name.
Check account access and visibility
Enable the platform's two-step verification or MFA. For messaging apps, never share a registration code or your account PIN.
Review linked devices and logged-in sessions regularly. Sign out devices you do not recognise.
Limit who can see your personal details, add you to groups, tag you or contact you.
Secure the email and mobile number used to recover the account.
Remove unnecessary third-party apps and quizzes with account access.
Verify requests from people you know
A familiar profile photo or an ongoing chat does not prove who is typing. Call the person using a number already saved in your contacts before sending money or a code. A message saying “I accidentally sent my code to you” is a reason to stop, not to forward the code.
If your account is taken over
Use the platform's official hacked-account or registration recovery process.
Secure your email and number, reset credentials and remove unfamiliar sessions or linked devices.
Tell contacts through another channel to ignore payment requests and links sent during the takeover.
Check changes to your profile, recovery details, advertising accounts and payment methods.
Preserve usernames, profile links, alerts and a timeline. Report impersonation through the platform's reporting tools.
If a fake profile copies you
Save the profile URL and report it as impersonation. Let your contacts know which account is yours. You do not need to engage with the impersonator. Avoid publicly posting more identity documents to prove your identity.
Useful references
Here to help
Something doesn’t look right?
Prepare an incident report with the details that matter.