KATY, Texas – A Katy woman said she’s scared for her life after getting threats because someone hacked into her Facebook account, pretending to sell items she’s never even seen before.
She said multiple would-be buyers already showed up at her house.
“I’m at a loss,” said Monique Sherman, adding she hasn’t been able to sleep in two weeks.
“I’m in fear for myself and I’m also upset for other people,” Sherman said.
It all started when she was locked out of her Instagram and Facebook accounts.
“I was online actually posting and then it flickered and then it asked me to put in password. And I was like ‘ok’ put in my password, it wouldn’t work,” Sherman said.
She said what came next was even more unexpected.
“I kept on getting activity to my phone saying I’m selling this, selling that. Seventy-three things…chicken coops, all kinds of stuff,” she said.
But Sherman said it was a fake ad selling a couch she’d never seen before that brought people to her front door looking for the furniture they’d already paid someone else for.
“I go out there and he’s like ‘yeah I’m here to pick up a couch.’ Two guys,” she said.
So far, she knows of three people showing up to her house. They had messages sent from her account that included a picture of her ID she thinks the hackers were able to access from the cloud.
“That’s what really scared me,” she said.
Sherman said she’s so scared of would-be buyers showing up at her home that she put the fake posts along with a police report she filled out on her door, hoping to deter them. She said she’s also in the process of installing a brand-new home surveillance system.
“They made a post. People were tagging me and saying ‘oh yeah, we’re going to get her,’” she said.
She said she was able to get that post taken down by reaching out to the user through a different page she has advertising her art, but with the fake couch ad still up, she’s preparing for more restless nights.
Like Sherman, we tried reaching out to Meta, the company that owns Facebook and got no response. The app does offer advice for keeping your account safe that includes making sure you have a unique and private password, activating two factor authentication and login alerts.
Sherman said she’s taking a break from social media altogether.
