How to detect a fake Facebook profile
✅ Does your Facebook group seem inundated with fake profiles?
✅ Are you afraid you or your group members might get scammed by a fake Facebook profile?
You might need to become a Fake Facebook Profile Detective!
Here are some top tips that a pending group member may be a scammer:
1. They join Facebook the same day they join your group.
Yes, your group is AWESOME and some people might sign up for Facebook simply to join your group! 👍
But other times, they sign up for Facebook to be a fake account that wants to scam people. 👎
2. Their name doesn’t look quite right.
They might have what look like two first names, really odd spellings, or something else that just doesn’t look like a real person’s name.
Example:
- David John Son (not a typical name, in America)
- Smith Brian (reversing last name and first name)
- Name does not match email address
2. Their email address doesn’t look real
Their email address might be completely different from their name.
For example, if the name is Bobby White and the email is lilianapulitzer@gmail.com, there is a good chance this is a fake account. Also, most people don’t use bobby123456@gmail.com as an email address.
Also: Are you asking people for their email addresses when they join your group?
If not, please read: Why it’s essential to collect email addresses from Facebook group members and how to do it – easily!
3. The profile is new-ish
This is not always the case – some of these fake profiles have been hiding out, slowly building up years and fake friends, for a while. However, if the profile is brand new, it’s worth taking an extra close look at other things – such as profile and public photos, name, answers to questions, etc., to make sure the profile is credible.
4. They belong to a LOT of different groups
And here is the important part: the groups don’t seem to have anything in common.
One tell-tale sign of a fake account, for my local community group, is that the account also belongs to other local community groups – literally all over the world. This tells me that they’re probably not truly interested in my community.
5. Their profile and public photos don’t make sense
Oftentimes, with a fake account, you’ll see that their profile photo (of a person) is a completely different person from their cover photo, or any other public photos they might have.
When this happens, they’ve usually stolen various photos from real (innocent) people and thrown them together on their Facebook account to give the appearance of being real.
6. When you google them, the results don’t confirm they’re a real person
You can also google the person. It’s especially helpful to google their name and location (ex: “Jim Badger, Buffalo, NY”). A solid google search can help you get a good read as to whether or not this person is in fact, real.
If nothing comes up – or what comes up is completely different from the profile that is joining your group, the account is probably fake.
It’s now time to report the fake profiles!
If you think a profile is fake, please report it to Facebook. Lately, Facebook doesn’t really do much about reported profiles, but I still report them because I think one day, this will change. The online world is a much better place without bots and spammers wreaking havoc on Facebook.
How to report a fake profile to Facebook.
More tips:
Also check out: 7 signs a pending Facebook group member is a bot or scammer
