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“They wanted my Instagram handle, and somehow they've now got it.”

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Re: “They wanted my Instagram handle, and somehow they've now got it.”

#81

Post by Zurrrrr »

0xffff2 wrote: post #78
Zurrrrr wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now try familytreenow.com for free or spokeo.com if you want to waste a dollar on a trial. Pretty sure they won't be wrong or out of date.

The first one is indeed much closer for me. Still doesn't have my current phone number and while the broad strokes are there the dates are wildly inaccurate. Looking at my immediate family though, I actually seem to have the worst hygiene! It's 0/5 in providing an accurate phone number for any of us.

It's cause this info is consolidated from so many different databases, but it's out there. Some of the paid ones are scarily accurate.

Re: “They wanted my Instagram handle, and somehow they've now got it.”

#82

Post by ufmace »

93po wrote: post #62

I don't know this person but objectively speaking, given the facts of the situation, I would say that it's more likely he sold his account and now wants it back for whatever reason. Maybe they people who bought it grifted him somehow and managed to reverse payment or something else. I wouldn't accuse someone of lying when I have no basis to, and I'm not. I'm just saying it's the more likely scenario versus some IG em…

I have no idea if this particular person did something like that. But as long as the practical tech support for this sort of thing is high-profile social media posts, something like this is going to happen eventually, if it hasn't already. It might be a good idea to hold off on the pitchforks until we've heard from the other side and/or the company involved.

Re: “They wanted my Instagram handle, and somehow they've now got it.”

#83

Post by elaus »

93po wrote: post #62

I don't know this person but objectively speaking, given the facts of the situation, I would say that it's more likely he sold his account and now wants it back for whatever reason. Maybe they people who bought it grifted him somehow and managed to reverse payment or something else. I wouldn't accuse someone of lying when I have no basis to, and I'm not. I'm just saying it's the more likely scenario versus some IG em…

> some IG employee risking their high paying career

I don't think most IG employees have a high-paying career – their support staff are probably located in countries with the lowest possible wages and it would not take a lot of money (from the perspective of the mentioned 'crypto bros') to bribe someone.

Also according to the post those 'crypto bros' wanted exactly _his_ IG handle, not any other 'higher value' handle.

Re: “They wanted my Instagram handle, and somehow they've now got it.”

#84

Post by iamthejuan »

This happened to me with bit.ly, they just for without a reason removed my access to my own username which is username. My other one is from GitHub but the good thing is GitHub just changed my username from username to usernamex probably due to naming collision.

Re: “They wanted my Instagram handle, and somehow they've now got it.”

#85

Post by BaseballPhysics »

93po wrote: post #70
BaseballPhysics wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wouldn't accuse someone of lying when I have no basis to, and I'm not. Uh, yeah you are.

I'm just stating likelihoods. I give him the benefit of the doubt. I only mention this to be conversational and to see if anyone else noticed something that might corroborate the theory. It makes little to no sense that this would be an inside job. It makes a lot of sense that this person just wants their account back after willfully giving it up. If you had an inside connection to take over an account, why wouldn't…

> It makes little to no sense that this would be an inside job.

In your opinion.

I do not share that opinion.

> why wouldn't you use it on something much much higher profile and with a lot more (i.e. any) profit potential?

Because it dramatically increases the likelihood of getting caught. Selling access to valuable but not high profile accounts is exactly what I'd do if I was a cautious insider looking to make a little extra cash on the dark web.

This guy happened to get lucky and his story caught some attention. Most don't.

Re: “They wanted my Instagram handle, and somehow they've now got it.”

#86

Post by themiracles »

BaseballPhysics wrote: post #85
93po wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm just stating likelihoods. I give him the benefit of the doubt. I only mention this to be conversational and to see if anyone else noticed something that might corroborate the theory. It makes little to no sense that this would be an inside job. It makes a lot of sense that this person just wants their account back after willfully giving it up. If you had an inside connection to take over an account, why wouldn't…

> It makes little to no sense that this would be an inside job. In your opinion. I do not share that opinion. > why wouldn't you use it on something much much higher profile and with a lot more (i.e. any) profit potential? Because it dramatically increases the likelihood of getting caught. Selling access to valuable but not high profile accounts is exactly what I'd do if I was a cautious insider looking to make a lit…

[dead]

Re: “They wanted my Instagram handle, and somehow they've now got it.”

#87

Post by ghusto »

We get what we deserve.

It's obvious in retrospect that one of the main ways tech companies make money is scale, without the costs that physical based companies bear with scale.

For example, you go to a shop, and they have employees they have to pay. When the shop scales, so does the number of employees. Tech companies aren't like that though. You write software, then scale it to as many users as possible (billions, in some cases), but their cheat-code, is that they don't provide support of any meaningful kind.

They can get away with it because they're not bound by physical interaction, and nobody's holding them accountable. Law is always understandably slow to catch up, but hopefully we'll get some reasonable regulation around tech soon.

Re: “They wanted my Instagram handle, and somehow they've now got it.”

#88

Post by tim333 »

supersour wrote: post #58
gabereiser wrote: post #57

There’s a black market business being run by Meta employees, selling the ability to take over these accounts from the inside for a price. They then funnel that cash back to family and friends and launder that cash through various other means. NYT reported about it last year.

I'd love the link if you have it

not nyt but https://gizmodo.com/meta-hackers-security-guards-facebook-in...

Re: “They wanted my Instagram handle, and somehow they've now got it.”

#89

Post by dgudkov »

newsclues wrote: post #48
rom-antics wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FB's net income for 2022 was $28.83 billion. They could drop that to $28.82 billion and fund a good size customer support team.

I think you underestimate either the cost or the scale of support tickets that would flood in constantly.

I think you underestimate $28.83 billion.
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