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Comment by bpodgursky | Hacker News Reader

I don't think there's any need for conspiracy theories. The human cost and PR impact of closing an incorrectly fake account are massive compared to the cost of closing one spammer.

Facebook is right to be incredibly cautious. Imagine getting your gmail or Facebook account shut down because of suspected fraud, and what a huge personal impact that would have on you. Facebook realizes this, and also realizes it is a PR nightmare every time one of those stories makes it onto HN / reddit.

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I am not sure I agree with this. If your bank freezes your account based on suspicious activity, do you change banks, or are you (usually) thankful? If FB is so important that it cannot even be unavailable for a few days - which BTW I find a bit hilarious, then you better be prepared to accept that it has to operate on a similar level of caution. It seems like on the one hand people want FB to be as dependable as a bank (after all, there is a phrase 'banking on it'), while they also don't want the level of precaution that a bank is usually expected to take.

Not that I actually care if FB is successful or not in their venture, and I will be very happy if they go the way of MySpace, but I don't agree with the human cost and PR impact you are talking about.

> If your bank freezes your account based on suspicious activity, do you change banks, or are you (usually) thankful?

I stopped using my personal PayPal for this reason.

I think the issue is that unfortunately a lot of internet based companies fail customer management when it comes to edge cases. I see this in the YouTube community relations, Facebook advertising and pages and AWS Help. It can be extremely hard to get edge cases solved by a company that is technology focused.

The customer relations for brick and mortar companies seems more flexible. I think sitting down with a manager at a bank works wonders when there is some strange thing holding up your account.

Paypal is all but a bank.

But yes they have along history of freezing and seizing money and accounts, stay away from paypal.

In Europe, Paypal is a bank ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PayPal )

Would it really be a "huge" impact if you were locked out of your account for a bit? They could have an appeals process. What negative things could actually occur in your life if you were denied access to Facebook for a week while they reviewed your appeal?

Have you considered that means you would be denied login on all the websites you used facebook login to register ?

Man, that just makes my average-to-good decision to not use that out-of-my-control login route brilliant!

100% for it, I'm always happy to see people freely sacrificing their control in the name of 'convenience' get fucked by that decision :)

The only way for them to integrate with a better society is to learn, really.

I do agree that conspiracy theory may be too much here, though your explanation is not in line with the reality as facebook is known around the world for blocking and closing accounts without blinking.

Turns out gmail has also a reputation for doing this and locking you out of your digital life.

I'd much rather have my account verified & tied to some data, than have 5+ fake friend requests per day where people that used to use FB for scams, said that FB would give them free ad credits. They never stopped them from adding people to groups or mass messaging them using bots.

Wait, what? The "human cost" of closing an online account? It's not like they're freezing your bank account. What stops you from creating another one?

What stops you creating a new Gmail account if Google deletes yours? Nothing, but you're not getting all that data back.

Getting that data "back" implied that it was yours to begin with...?

You at no point anted up the resources or effort to maintain that data, that was all them. You freely volunteered it to them in the name of 'convenience'; I don't see what part of that arrangement implies they owe you anything once you've finally realized the stupidity of that decision.

Life is not a series of 'okay, I learned my lesson, now please fix it for me' kindergarten tutorials. If it takes a significant loss of data you thought was rightfully yours for you to learn the value of data, then take your lumps and consider it a bargain.

You're moving the goalposts. First you said there's no personal cost to losing an account; now you're saying there is a cost but one deserves it. Which is it?

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