Having a Facebook account is not enough, but having a secure Facebook account is the key. How will you feel after building your brand on Facebook for many years only to lose the account to a scammer in just a day.
We are going to discuss the key ways you can make your Facebook account impossible to hack even by someone that has your login details without your knowledge.
The good news is that you don’t have to be a computer guru before you can do any of what we are about to discuss.
To setup an account that will give scammers hard time to steal from you, you should turn on the following settings;
The number one setting you should turn on is the Get alerts about unrecognized logins setting. This setting helps you to receive a notification alert on your Facebook app, email or phone when someone tries to login into your account without your permission or when someone wants to make a change to the security settings of your Facebook account.
To turn on the alert setting, all you should do is to follow the steps below on your Facebook app;
Go to Menu> Settings & Privacy> Settings> Security and Login> scroll down to Setting Up Extra Security section> select Get alerts about unrecognized logins > then, select and turn on different options you will like to use in receiving the notification alert.
After you might have turned on the security alert options, the next thing you need to know is what you should do whenever you receive this security alert from Facebook.
Every security alert you receive will come with an option asking you to secure your account if you are not the one that is performing the action you are alerted about. You will then have to follow the link and follow the instructions as they appear. This will help you to disrupt the scammer’s process before they get deep into your account.
The second setting you should turn on is the two-factor authentication setting. This setting will make your account request another login code aside from your password before one can login into your account. To turn this setting on, you will be asked to choose your preferred method to receive the code whenever you want to log into your account.
There are two options on how you can receive your code, you can receive it through text messages on your registered phone number or through authentication app.
Before you chose authentication app as your option, make sure you have an authentication app already installed on your phone (eg. Microsoft authenticator or Google authenticator) and remember to backup the scanned bar code (QR Code) you used for the setup for future use.
To turn on two-factor authentication simply;
Go to Menu > Settings & Privacy> Settings> Security and Login> scroll down to Two-Factor authentication section > select Use Two-factor authentication > select one option you like to use in receiving the code Text message or authentication app > then confirm the phone number or your authentication app depending on your choice in the last step.
If you choose text message as your option for receiving the code, make sure you select Recovery Codes as your backup method. You can read my post on Recovery code here. This is because, there may be times when you will not have your phone available to receive the code or a case where the phone you use in receiving the code got stolen.
This setting will give your account additional layer of security thereby making it difficult for scammers to bypass without having to deal with you first.
The third setting you should check is Where you’re logged in settings. This setting shows you different devices you are logged in on and from the setting you can log yourself out from those devices.
This is another setting you should look at when you receive a security alert of someone logging in into your account to know if they are logged in already or not. If they are logged in into your account, you will see their device name and location on the list of where you are logged in.
To check this setting;
Go to Menu > Settings & Privacy> Settings> Security and Login> Where you’re logged in > select See All > then select the three vertical dots beside the device name and location and select log out. This will log the person out from the devices as you then go ahead to change your password.
The last but not the least setting you should look at is the password setting and the choose friends to contact if you get locked out settings.
The Password we use also contribute on how easy it will be for scammers to log into our account. Avoid creating a password with known dictionary words like comehome20, mylifein2020, john1998, pa$$word, jude1991 etc. Learn to include special character like full stop and space, @, # etc. on your password.
Another protection layer you can put in place for yourself is to add three of your trusted friends name on choose friends to contact if you get locked out setting. They will serve as those you will contact when you are logged out of Facebook. Before you add any of your friends to this list, make sure they have a secure account too and will be available when you need them.
To access this setting;
Go to Menu > Settings & Privacy> Settings> Security and Login> under Recommended select choose friends to contact if you get locked out > Then select the add button and search for the friend you want to add.
Once you are done adding, click on done and select cancel to go back and select done again. Now you are done.
If you activate the above settings and avoid giving out your sensitive details online to strangers, then your Facebook account will now be in state where it is now literally impossible to hack.
Remember to share your views and questions on the comment box.
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