\u201cThere was no shop. It was just blank. That was a shock.\u201d<\/p>\n
Despite following all available recovery steps, Kelly said there was \u201cabsolutely no way\u201d to get it back by himself.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought, \u2018that\u2019s that\u2019,\u201d he said. \u201cI kind of resigned to that fact. There was nothing I could do.\u201d<\/p>\n
H\u0113mi Kelly says the experience of losing control of his Instagram account has been a wake-up call. Photo \/ Jason Dorday<\/p>\n
He said the loss had an immediate emotional and financial impact.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy reach was gone,\u201d he said. \u201cAdvertising. Visibility. I was thinking, \u2018I\u2019ve got to rebuild. I\u2019ve got to start all over again\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked how it affected him, Kelly said simply, \u201cYeah. Tears.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kelly said he tried to get in touch with Meta, but only ended up dealing with what he described as countless AI-powered bots and got nowhere.<\/p>\n
After exhausting his options he turned to the Herald, which managed to contact a senior communications director at Meta.<\/p>\n
Within hours the account was back in Kelly\u2019s control.<\/p>\n
Although the communications director agreed to help, they also suggested it would be better if the Herald did not publish an article, saying it could lead to more people with account issues contacting the newsroom.<\/p>\n
Kelly was thankful to get his account back but unimpressed with Meta.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt no point did they just take control of the situation and go, \u2018okay, it\u2019s all fixed\u2019,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
H\u0113mi Kelly lost his Instagram account Everyday Maori, which has 77,000 followers, after a phishing scam. Photo \/ Jason Dorday<\/p>\n
He said the experience had been a wake-up call.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt showed me how heavily I rely on this one platform,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was all in one place and then all of a sudden that was gone.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kelly is not alone in being scammed. Netsafe and the Global Anti-Scam Alliance estimated New Zealanders lost a record $3 billion to scams in 2025 in their \u201cState of Scams in New Zealand\u201d report.<\/p>\n
Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Cameron Brewer said Meta needs to do better.<\/p>\n
\u201cI expect large tech companies operating in New Zealand to be contactable and responsive to consumers and small businesses.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said the Consumer Guarantees Act guarantees a platform\u2019s services are performed with reasonable care and skill, and this could extend to a platform\u2019s process for suspending accounts.<\/p>\n
\u201cMeta is a valued member of the New Zealand Anti-Scam Alliance, and I encourage them to engage to support our small businesses.<\/p>\n
\u201cI welcome any further cases like this to be brought to my attention.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Herald went back to Meta and asked for a response to the minister\u2019s comments, and asked why Kelly was unable to recover the account through ordinary support channels.<\/p>\n
A Meta spokesperson did not answer these questions but did point to work the company was doing to improve account security and support.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were pleased to help Mr Kelly regain access to his account. Account theft through phishing is a challenge across the internet, and we take it very seriously.\u201d<\/p>\n
New account hacks have decreased by more than 30% globally on Facebook and Instagram, according to the spokesperson, who said Meta had launched AI support, video selfie verification and security tools such as passkeys.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe encourage people to enable two-factor authentication and be vigilant about phishing attempts,\u201d the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe value our participation in the New Zealand Anti-Scam Alliance and our ongoing engagement with the New Zealand Government to keep people safe online.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThere was no shop. It was just blank. That was a shock.\u201d Despite following all available recovery steps,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":480790,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[241776,29184,74,3378,9442,115,40124,6309,1459,45062,38403,1668,241775,4791,18220,5836,898,2720,111,43,139,69,241774,2838,1461,1326,61,14043,11226,6923,95451,377],"class_list":["post-480789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-77000follower","tag-account","tag-after","tag-appeared","tag-better","tag-calls","tag-creator","tag-do","tag-email","tag-everyday","tag-falling","tag-front","tag-hmi","tag-instagram","tag-kelly","tag-lost","tag-meta","tag-mori","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-regains","tag-routine","tag-scam","tag-shop","tag-to","tag-upgrade","tag-urged","tag-what","tag-wiping","tag-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=480789"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480789\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/480790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=480789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=480789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=480789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}