Alodia Deleted from Facebook Again

Filipina cosplay queen Alodia Gosiengfiao is on a roll. After winning the Hall Costume Award at the 2010 San Diego Comic-Con, she’s now being considered for a role in the upcoming Warcraft movie. Her growing fame shows on her Facebook page, where she’s accumulated over a hundred thousand fans. As far as I know, she’s the most popular cosplayer on Facebook.

Of course, success breeds haters.

Haters Gonna Hate

Normal haters bash you on Facebook. Alodia’s haters are more vicious: they’ve managed to delete her from Facebook. Last year, Alodia’s personal profile mysteriously vanished. Fortunately, it was later restored. Unfortunately, now both Alodia’s fan page and personal profile have vanished.

When Alodia asked why, Facebook replied with this message:

Your account has been suspended because we have received reports that your account could be in violation of our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities.

Impersonating anyone or anything is prohibited, and fake accounts are a violation of our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities.

Apparently, Alodia’s haters have been reporting her personal profile as “fake”.

Modus Operandi

This is not the first time a Filipina cosplayer’s Facebook account fell victim to false reports. A few weeks earlier, Alodia’s sister Ashley saw her Facebook profile taken down through the same modus operandi. Before that, up-and-coming Filipina cosplayer Jen Ching suffered the same fate. In Ashley’s case, she had to submit a picture of her passport for Facebook to verify her identity and restore her account.

Let’s hope Facebook restores Alodia’s account, and develops safeguards to prevent abuse of its reporting feature. Facebook dominates the social Web, and the Web dominates the world. We don’t want to see people cut off from their friends based solely on false accusations. Personally, I’d hate to see haters take down a girl on the verge of bringing Hollywood fame to an emerging artform.

Identity Arms Race

If ever your own Facebook account gets blocked or disabled, here’s what Facebook says you can do about it. In the meantime, vigilantly report anyone who impersonates you on Facebook. Facebook requires you to enter an impersonated profile before reporting a fake profile. Saboteurs can create a fake profile, report your profile as fake, and claim their fake profiles were impersonated. If you eliminate all fake profiles, no one can report your real profile as “fake”.

Dealing with Facebook saboteurs is an identity arms race. Take down their fake profiles, before they take down your real profile.

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