New Facebook Bug: Disabling Accounts – Sexist

November 17, 2010 4 Comments

Last night a rogue bug hit Facebook, but oddly decided to turn sexist and only disable female accounts. Facebook has said that a problem occurred in their system which was designed to hunt down fake accounts and then disable them pending a review.

The bug was swiftly fixed and Facebook has issued a statement since saying that “the bug was live for a very short time [and] caused a very small percentage of Facebook accounts to be mistakenly disabled. Upon discovering the bug, we worked immediately to resolve it. It’s now been fixed, and we’re in the process of reactivating and notifying the people who were affected”. Statement courtesy of Thinq.

The bug was acknowledged by the social network, however it is unclear why only female accounts were targeted and disabled. In the meantime those who wrongly have had their accounts disabled have found alternate methods of broadcasting their opinion by taking to Twitter and blogging their displeasure.

What do you think about the bug and it only affecting females? If the problem has happened to you and your account has been disabled, get in touch with us by leaving a comment.

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  • char

    They did it to my mom who barely knows how to use facebook. After we googled who to email about it (their help section on the website is terrible) we emailed them and she received this reply this morning:

    Hi,

    Fake accounts are a violation of our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities. Facebook requires users to provide their real first and last names. Impersonating anyone or anything is prohibited, as is maintaining multiple profiles on the site. Unfortunately, we will not be able to reactivate this account for any reason. This decision is final.

    Thanks for your understanding,

    The Facebook Team

    There is nothing in her profile that would indicate she is fake at all! They restored it for about half an hour and now it is disabled again.

  • Guest

    Really? They sent me TWO of those things and at the MOMENT, I am still working. They sent the emails 10 hours ago. I've replied, but that's scary that she has stopped working.

  • Kim

    UG this happened to me without reason or warning. They have turned it back on but I then recieved another e-mail from the ghost "facebook team" saying that my account is fake and they have made a final decision to disable it! So annoying and wrong, I have had my account for several years with out issue and use it to communicate with family and friends nothing shady at all.

  • Yvonne

    Since many joined fb to stay connected to far flung family and friends, this disabling of legitimate users is a hard blow. Facebook better get a more accurate way of determining fake vs real in short order, or frustrations like the above will drive users away in large numbers. I might just have one foot out the door already.