UPDATE 1:11 p.m.: Our control of the page appears to be restored. The feed of news headlines to the page should resume soon.
The Batavian's page on Facebook is not currently controlled by any person associated with The Batavian. It was hijacked.
We have notified Facebook and are working with a local news association to try and regain control of the page.
We initially lost control of the page on Monday morning and regained control by the afternoon. We lost control again on Tuesday morning and have been unable to regain control.
It's my fault, in a way. I downloaded an app from the Apple Store called Pages Manager Suite from a developer called Meta Sun Company Limited. That app appears to be the most likely culprit in the hijack. The hijackers appear to have used Facebook's programming interface to take over my business manager account, demoting me to "employee," removing all business information and access to my business pages, and installing themselves as "business admin(s)."
The Apple Store is supposed to be a "walled garden" with security features to prevent malicious apps from appearing in the store. This same app is in the store, I now see, multiple times from multiple "developers." So beware if you have a Facebook business account and come across an app you think might help you manage your Facebook business pages. Facebook (Meta, now, really, at a corporate level) does offer an app called Business Suite. Stick to that app no matter how much you may find it annoying.
A security advisor's biggest concern is that the hijackers wanted to use the page to buy Facebook ads using my credit card. Fortunately, they were unable to remove my access to my ad manager account, and I've deactivated the account.
So far, there is nothing amiss with our page. There is no evidence of it being used to install malware or post false information or spam. The hijackers could potentially use messenger to fool people into downloading something malicious but I've received no complaints of any such attempt.
For the time being, we are unable to post news links to the page.
I'm told it may take weeks for Facebook to resolve the issue but that Facebook will likely eventually resolve it satisfactorily.
