Apparently your Facebook Timeline doesn’t end when your life does.

Boston Herald front page:

 

 

From the Herald report:

Two of [Michael Marshalsea’s] daughters told the Herald they were shocked and dismayed that a ghoulish imposter took over their dead father’s [Facebook] profile, changing the former electrician’s “likes” – which ranged from the Patriots and the Bruins to fishing, boating and barbecuing – to video games, metal bands and Harry Potter.

 

The family got nowhere with Facebook until the Herald intervened, the Herald reports.

The social media behemoth took swift action after being contacted by the Herald and memorialized the account – basically freezing the account and thus preventing any further mischief.

 

The Herald also speculates on the motives for this digital grave robbing:

The power of a Facebook “like” may be behind what fueled the hijacking of a dead man’s Facebook account, most likely by overseas “black-hat hackers,” say cyber experts.

David Gerzof Richard, a social-media marketing professor at Emerson College, cited tech blogs that put a dollar amount on a single Facebook “like” from $3.60 to $136.78.

 

For 850 million Facebook users, not much to like about that.

John R. Carroll is media analyst for NPR's Here & Now and senior news analyst for WBUR in Boston. He also writes at Campaign Outsider and It's Good to Live in a Two-Daily Town.
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