What should you do if your Facebook business page is hacked?
Submit Meta's Facebook Page recovery form first: Meta calls it the fastest way to recover a Page, even if you have Meta Verified, and says it aims to reply by email within a day. If you cannot log in at all, Meta points to facebook.com/hacked on a device you have used before. While you wait, warn customers and check your ad account and card. Once back in, undo changes you do not recognize and keep more than one trusted admin.
How Pages usually get taken over
Meta's help page gives two examples: a hacker steals an admin's password, logs into that person's account, adds themselves to the Page and removes the owner's access; or a scammer tricks an admin into handing over control, sometimes inside Meta Business Suite. Either way, the Page is usually lost through a person's account or access, not the Page itself.
Meta also notes that losing access is not always hacking: it can happen because you are not the authorized representative of the Page's subject, or because the Page was reported and removed for going against the Community Standards. Those cases follow a different route, covered in the related answer on why Facebook unpublishes a business Page.
Getting the Page back
- Use the Facebook Page recovery form. Meta says you can only submit it while logged in and if you recently lost access to the Page.
- If the form will not let you pick your Page, Meta says that means it does not see a recent loss of access.
- If you cannot log in, Meta says to visit facebook.com/hacked on a device you have used to log in before.
- Meta says it can only act on the report if it can confirm the Page was compromised, and that some reviews may take longer than a day.
While you wait
These steps are general advice, not Meta's. Tell customers through your website, email or other accounts not to trust offers or payment requests sent from the Page until you say it is fixed. Open your ad account and look for ads, spending or people you did not add, and call your bank about any charge you did not make. Change the password on the email address tied to your Facebook login and turn on two-step sign-in there; the related answer on a hacked business email account covers that side.
After you are back in
Meta's listed steps: if your account was locked for security, open Facebook and follow the prompts to unlock it; look through your Page and business portfolio and undo any changes you do not recognize; turn on Advanced Protection or take other steps to secure the account; and stay alert to scams and phishing.
As general advice, keep at least two admins from the business so one lost login does not lose the Page, as the related answer on who should own your ad accounts recommends for ad accounts. Instagram's own help pages on hacked accounts could not be read for this answer, so it covers Facebook only; for an Instagram account, start in the Instagram Help Center.
Sources
Related answers
- Who should own your Google Ads and Facebook ad accounts?
- What should you do if your business email account is hacked?
- What should you do if your Google Ads account is hacked or shows charges you did not make?
- How can you tell if your business website has been hacked, and what do you do first?
- Why did Facebook unpublish or limit your business Page, and how do you appeal?
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