The Philippines’ Department of Justice (DOJ) urged Filipinos to report the dummy accounts on Facebook bearing their name, following reports that netizens who have aired their grievances against the Anti-Terror Bill—particularly students, activities, and journalists— have been victimized by the emergence the fake profiles.
In its Facebook post, DOJ’s Office of Cybercrime (OOC) said they have been receiving reports regarding the creation of the accounts apparently of people who have criticized the bill. The Office encouraged the victims to submit a report to them with the following format:
Name: (e.g., Juan Dela Cruz)
Facebook profile username: (e.g., Juan Dela Cruz)
Facebook profile account link: (e.g., www.facebook.com/juan.delacruz)
Dummy account username: (e.g., Juan Delacruz)
Dummy account link: (e.g., www.facebook.com/juan.dela.cruz.111)
“Please be reminded that the intentional acquisition, use, misuse, transfer, possession, alteration or deletion of identifying information belonging to another, whether natural or juridical, without right, and with or without damage, is a crime denominated as Computer-related Identity-Theft, which is defined and penalized under Section 4 (b)(3) of R.A. No. 10175 or the Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012,” said OOC in its post.
“Any person found guilty of the said offense shall be IMPRISONED for 6 years and 1 day to 12 years or shall be FINED at least Php200,000.00 up to a maximum amount commensurate to the damage incurred, or BOTH,” the Office added.
OOC also called on everyone to report the fake accounts with these steps:
Step 1: Visit the profile of the dummy account
Step 5: Indicate the Facebook username of the person the dummy account is pretending to be
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