What to do if your Facebook friends start receiving new friend requests from you

By Rick Rouse
Rick's Daily Tech Tips

Well, the account cloning epidemic on Facebook is showing no signs of letting up. In fact, it seems to be getting worse.

Every day I see frantic posts from several of my friends saying they've been hacked and not to accept a new friend request from them.

I know how alarming it can be when your friends start sending you messages saying they've received duplicate friend requests from you, but the situation really isn't as dire as it seems. 
The important thing to understand about this situation is your account cannot send a friend request to someone who is already your friend. Sending duplicate friend requests wouldn't serve any useful purpose, therefore Facebook doesn't even give you the option of sending them.
What's more, hackers can't send duplicate friend requests either, even if they somehow manage to assume control of your account. In short, the "duplicate" friend requests your friends are receiving aren't duplicates at all. They are being sent from an entirely different account.

What's happening is some scammers on Facebook are cloning (i.e. making fraudulent copies) of accounts, NOT hacking the original accounts.

What they're doing is simply copying whatever personal info you have made public on your account along with a few of your pictures and using that info to create a brand new account in your name. They then send all of your Facebook friends a friend request from the new fake account.

After they have tricked several of your friends into "friending" the fake account, they use that account to spread malware and scam other Facebook users - starting with your friends.
I know that sounds serious, and it is. But luckily it isn’t anywhere near as serious as actually having your account hacked.

If your Facebook account gets cloned by a scammer, your real account hasn't been hacked. You don't need to change your password. All you need to do is ask your friends who receive the fraudulent friend requests to report the fake account so it will (hopefully) be taken down by Facebook.

And finally, always remember this: The less information you make available to the public on your Facebook profile, the less information a potential scammer will have to work with (i.e. steal) if he decides he wants to clone your account.

That's why I recommend "hiding" as much info as possible from everyone except your friends. It's also a good idea to limit the types of information you publish on your profile in the first place, starting with hiding your Friends List from the public.

Bonus tip: This post explains why there's really no such thing as "privacy" on Facebook.