Facebook Hack Concerns Resurfacing for Charlotte-Mecklenburg Animal Care & Control

CHARLOTTE — Since the fall of 2022, Melissa Knicely and the rest of the employees at Charlotte-Mecklenburg Animal Care and Control have been victims of a Facebook hack.

“If you really look through them,  I can see why people would be confused,” Knicely said while comparing the old and new Facebook Pages.

When the social media’s parent company, Meta, wouldn’t grant the shelter access back to it’s own page, Knicely bit the bullet and started a new one.

“It’s sad. We had about 30,000 followers on that page. On our new page, we only have about 4000,” explained Knicely on the decision to create a new page.

Knicely believes the shelter has lost out on thousands of dollars worth of donations because of the hack.

Knicely says the  hacker go dormant on the old page for months at a time. That changed around the holidays when dozens of posts were made

“This is the most that it’s ever been,” said Knicely about the amount of posts in recent weeks.

Some of the posts ask for donations, others are just random videos of animal drawings. A  majority of the posts ask the community to adopt an animal from other shelters in the area.

Their appears to be no rhyme or reason for what the hacker is posting…

“It almost feels a little personal,” Knicely said of the hack.

Knicely wants to get the word out in hopes no one falls victim to a possible scam. To this point, she’s not aware anyone has.

Knicely is hoping to get the old page shutdown. She’s asking any attorney in the area, with expertise in the matter, to help out.

Meta did not respond to our request for comment.

Click here for a link to the new Facebook account.