Instagram users who are victims of hacking now have a new way to try to recover their account. Company announced Instagram.com/hacked today, a new feature for reporting and attempting to fix account access issues.
The new platform is an all-in-one account support page. Users can request help recovering hacked accounts, report impersonation accounts, or get help if they forget their password. Probably the most pressing issue for many is getting help when an account has been hacked – something users have struggled with in the past.
Recovering a hacked Instagram account wasn’t easy; a 2018 Motherboard report details how some users have paid ransoms to hackers who have held their accounts hostage. A separate 2019 report showed how influencers who let their accounts catch up have had to do turn to other hackers for help. In both cases, users say that Instagram itself was slow to respond or not at all.
Instagram earlier this year announced it was testing account recovery features like asking a user’s friends to vouch for them to regain control of their account. The company said today that the feature is now available to everyone: users who lose access to their account can select two friends who can help verify their identities.
The company also says it’s working on ways to stop account hacking before it happens, including sending alerts about suspicious accounts that could be impersonating someone else.
More generally, Meta is finally starting to build a more robust customer service department focused on helping users who run into account and moderation issues. It may seem surprising that it has lasted this long, especially given the sheer scale of platforms like Facebook, which added live chat support last year.
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