CINCINNATI — Several local bars and restaurants have lost control of their social media pages after hackers took control of their accounts, in some cases getting the account permanently banned.
Arnold's Bar & Grill is one such victim.
Owner Chris Breeden said he was on his Facebook page when the account was hacked and, despite his best efforts, the perpetrators were able to take over his personal and business pages.
They took it one step further, posting explicit material on the bar's Instagram account, which in turn got the page permanently deleted. Then, the hackers infiltrated the business page's advertising account, racking up charges.
"I got a notification that says someone from Los Angeles was logging in," said Breeden. "I booted them, then they continued to try to ... they added their friends after I had booted them. I went through and found everything that was connected to my Facebook, every device. I booted everything that didn't look totally familiar to me, then they added them again and so I went in and booted the user and I blocked them and it still happened to me."
Breeden said Facebook isn't being helpful in remedying the problem, and he's worried that, without social media, his business will feel the impact.
Arnold's isn't the only local bar or restaurant to suffer that fate: owners with The Crown Republic, Losanti, Crown Cantina and Rosie's Italian all confirmed they were hit by a similar attack.
In September, The Belle and the Bear in Montgomery experienced a similar attack and is still trying to recover after the loss of social media pages hurt their connection with their customers.
"We had about 25,000 followers on Facebook, which is a huge following for a restaurant our size," said Ceris Christopher, owner. "Then we also lost our Instagram, which is about 12,000 followers."
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