Georgia man says friends scammed out of thousands of dollars after his Facebook is hacked

COBB COUNTY, Ga. — A Cobb County man says at least three of his Facebook friends have given money to an imposter controlling his Facebook page.

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“These are good friends of mine, and they trust me,” Kerry Jackson said.

Jackson reported his page being hacked to Facebook more than two weeks ago, but the issue still has not been resolved.

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On his Facebook page, Jackson appears to be helping an uncle sell some high-priced items.

“Cars, trucks, a water slide, hot tub, things like that,” he said.

However, while it is the Cobb County resident’s Facebook page, it’s not him.

“I got a text from my friend in Mississippi saying, ‘How large is the hot tub you’re selling?’ And I don’t have a hot tub. What is this? He said, ‘I think you’ve been hacked.’”

Jackson says he realized he’d been hacked almost immediately, all the way back in late July.

“I tried to log in. I was blocked,” Jackson said. “My password is no longer valid.”

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That’s when he reported it to Facebook and followed their instructions, uploading a driver’s license to prove his identity.

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“The notification said that they’ll get back with me within 48 hours,” Jackson recalled. “It has now been two and a half weeks since that happened.”

In that time, at least one of Jackson’s friends fell for the scam and lost cash to the imposter.

Yale Wall saw the post from his home in Indianapolis and messaged the person he suspected was not his friend, Kerry.

“Because Kerry is such a great guy, and people trust him,” Wall said. “They’re willing to trust whatever’s on his Facebook.”

Earlier this month, a similar thing happened on a Dunwoody Facebook group.

Someone hacked a group member and was offering fake Taylor Swift Tickets.

In Jackson’s case, he says more than a dozen of his Facebook friends have reported the fraud only to get a message from Facebook saying that the post “Doesn’t go against our community standards.”

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“They are committing fraud,” Jackson said. “They’re committing a crime pretending to be me.”

Facebook has an entire section on its site addressing what to do if an account gets hacked. Jackson says he followed all those steps more than two weeks ago. He’s concerned with why it’s taking Facebook so long to fix the issue.

We’ve tried to ask the company that question, but they haven’t responded.

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