My Instagram Business Account Was Suspended With No Warning (and No Recourse!)

Meta’s AI has permanently suspended the Blue Buddha Boutique business Instagram account. Gone. Poof. No way to appeal.

It's my fault; I’ll own up to that, and I want to share my story to help raise awareness for other business owners so you can avoid my mistake and protect your Meta business accounts.

The Backstory

Back in 2019, I stepped away from my personal social media accounts. I have zero regrets about doing this, because I was struggling with depression, and social media was just too overwhelming at the time. However, Meta doesn't let you run a Facebook business page without a personal profile. To keep my Facebook and Instagram accounts for Blue Buddha Boutique and Rebeca Mojica Jewelry, I created a faux account using a maternal family name along with a profile photo of my cat.

Before I deactivated my personal page, I added admin privileges to the "Fauxbook" profile. I knew it was breaking the rules to do this, but I wasn’t running any scams, and rarely even posted, so I thought I would be able to fly under the radar. Honestly, being depressed, I just didn’t have the bandwidth to think things through.

The Suspension

Everything chugged along just fine for 5 years. I'd slowly started to interact a bit more on IG and TikTok, but had no desire to resurrect my Facebook account.

Then a couple weeks ago, when I tried to log in, Facebook suddenly required me to verify my identity with a photo ID. Obviously, I couldn't. Immediately, all my associated business accounts were suspended. In total, 7 business accounts were affected—all B3 and RMJ pages as well as the inactive-but-nice-for-archival-purposes DIY Trunk Show page and CHAINED book page.

When I tried to find out why the suspension of the business pages occurred, Meta served up a generic answer that basically said "Our AI did this."

I begrudgingly reactivated my real personal account to regain control of my accounts and appeal the suspension. Within a few hours, Meta reinstated the accounts. Then they suspended them again. ... And then reinstated them. Talk about whiplash! At the end of the day, everything was restored—including my faux account(!)—except for the B3 Instagram account. It was permanently banned, with no option to appeal.

In the middle of all of the suspensions, Meta kept directing me toward a section on "hate speech" as the reason, but anyone who knows anything about me or my business knows that is just ridiculous. (In fact, I’m the one reporting messages from either randos bugging my customers to “be friends” or from anti-LGBTQ+ folks leaving hateful messages on pride-related posts.) So I have a strong suspicion the suspension is not related to hate speech, but rather is because of my fauxbook account.

I understand that I violated Facebook's terms of service, but the whole experience has been quite dispiriting. Especially when I think about the amount of actual hate speech, misinformation, and scams that run rampant on the platform.

Learn from my mistake!

I’m not looking for sympathy or outrage on my behalf. Like I said, I know I messed up. I'm sharing this because I want to raise awareness. I'm sure I'm not the only business owner who has used a personal account that doesn’t match the name on my ID to manage a business page. If you're doing this, be aware that you could face the same consequences. Not only does the page manager’s personal account need to match that person's legal name, but so do all other admins on the page. 

Secondly, it's a reminder that social media platforms hold immense power over our online presence. Their algorithms and policies can have a devastating impact on businesses, often with little to no recourse for users. While researching what I could do, I discovered countless other stories of business owners whose shops had been hacked, and there was zero support from Facebook in restoring their accounts.

What's next?

While I'm disappointed about losing my business account, I'm trying to focus on the positive. I’m thankful that I didn’t rely on sales from B3’s IG, and out of all my active business social media accounts, that one was the least active. I've actually struggled to try to post consistently on B3 and RMJ, so maybe this is a blessing in disguise?

If you've been following me as Blue Buddha on IG, I invite you to either follow the Blue Buddha Boutique page on Facebook, or @rebecamojicajewelry on Instagram. You can also find me on TikTok @officialrebecamojica. I now realize I could lose these accounts at any time, but I’ll just go full steam ahead and hope for the best! 🤞🏼 

This experience has been a tough lesson, and a bit embarrassing. But I don’t have regrets about prioritizing my mental health. Ultimately, I'm choosing to move forward and focus on what I can control: creating beautiful jewelry, inspiring crafters and connecting with my audience in authentic ways. I appreciate each and every one of you!

Have any of you had a social media account suspended, or content removed unexpectedly? Share your story in the comments. I'd love to hear about your experiences and how you handled them.