LinkedIn locked me out of my own account. The only way back is through Persona — a third-party service that wants a photo of my passport, a scan of my face, and a recording of my movements (liveness detection: turn your head, follow the dot, so a still photo can’t stand in for me). The stated reason: “unusual activity.” The real reason, of course, is big tech spearheading a movement toward absolute control over people.
They did the same shit to me. I refused and pestered them with numerous e-mails demanding them to just delete my account instead of reopening it. Finding a link to their contact form was a nightmare (it’s hidden all the way at the bottom of their privacy policy). I also emailed legal@linkedin.com, dpo@linkedin.com, helpdesk@linkedin.com, support@linkedin.com and a number of other generic addresses just to be sure they would receive something.
I got three LLM sounding replies where they asked me to follow a link to verify my identity with a government issued identity document, but after a couple more e-mails where I wrote that providing Persona or LinkedIn with my identity documents is against my personal security policy, they just caved and reopened my account calling it a “temporary measure to protect my account”. Set a new password, logged in and deleted my account immediately. Good riddance.
TBH I’m impressed you got that far. I’d have thought they would 100% stonewall you.
Good riddance for sure. That co has a long history of being sleazeweasels.
Thanks for this post. Saving it in case I ever need it.
FWIW. I have defeated live cam with subtle random movement with an AI generated face video looking straight ahead with slight movement, blinking, slightly wider shot (wider shot mean angles aren’t as obvious and a little random movement was sufficient).
I served this back through OBS (Open Broadcast Studio).
But it’s fucked that we need to resort to tricks.
That’s the worst part, their justification for more information to make one safer doesn’t even work. For-profit security theater.
I think it’s worse than security theatre. I am not usually a tin foil hatter, but im convinced tech isn’t fighting back on this because it’s a great opportunity to hone in that personal advertising.
Notice how they push back on EVERY legislative move or new regulation. But, suddenly now that the same tech can help them out, crickets… ?
Agreed, it’s as if you would let the locksmith go through your mail, indefinitely, after they fixed your frontdoor.
Absolutely ridiculous, right? Well… not so much when your entire digital life goes through gatekeepers like Google, Apple or Microsoft.
Can we all just agree to adopt a new open source option? That is the only way companies will find us for next jobs. They unfortunately contacted me using LinkedIn in my last 2 jobs so, it is impractical to leave without having a replacement.
I got at least one job through LinkedIn but it wasn’t a quality job. Pay was good but was subcontracted and we were treated differently. In my industry you really need to know someone. Linkedin does help in a pinch for sure though.
Maybe a Freindica Business option. Wonder if it’s open source. Maybe, it needs to be free with student IDs or some type of apprenticeship, and paid for by professionals, or just some other bot prevention measure.
Maybe have it with an interface that auto uploads formats that can be used by employers for resumes. Then you can sell the interface option to employers as a way to get resumes autofilled. Might be complicated.
My company has huge retention, people dont tpically leave. Maybe entry roles but they progress to decent conditions really quick. It is usually a job for life with people often doing 40+ years.
Everyone is on LinkedIn. Posting company shit, and liking each others posts. Very odd time someone leaves for a similar role elsewhere but usually either really high level roles and post retirement or entry level management. It boggles my mind, the company even holds days where they get photographers to go out to sites to take linkedIn profile pictures.
Same bullshit happened to me when they froze my account after their AI bot flagged me with on false positive for “discrimination” (I’d posted a job with a legitimate language requirement).
They then made me go through some humiliating ritual of having to write them an email with a written promise that I wouldn’t break any discrimination rules, which I hadn’t done to begin with, but the support clown wouldn’t reinstate my account until I’d done their specified grovelling.
Why did you not refuse and find a new place to do business that doesn’t use computer programs to police their sites?
If you’re a salaried employee who isn’t currently looking for work then this might be an option. If you’re a consultant who relies on networking then LinkedIn has a near-monopoly. If you’re not on it then potential clients will assume there’s something wrong.
Probably because they want to actually make some money.
By all accounts I’ve heard, linkedin is garbage. No one finds work there.
And yet 99% of good paying jobs won’t even consider you if you don’t have a LinkedIn. You don’t have to apply on there, or even be active, but you do need one.
I used to host my own professional portfolio. Maybe it’s time to do that again. It was just easy html that I whipped up in KompoZer.
It used to show publications, training certificates, codes, visualizations of analytic codes, hobbyist builds, etc.
That’s news to me I haven’t heard that yet.
I do know a lot of corporate jobs make you hand over social media handles and passwords to do a deep dive on you, then run all your information through threat detection software to see the likelihood that you will develop a case of morals or patriotism that would lead you leak details of the company. That was going on 15 years ago, can’t imagine how bad it is now for banks and the like.
They accept written/scanned proof of identity signed by a municipal office (german here). Basically, show your ID to an official and haven them sign a paper to proof your identity. Also, a friend told me, a LinkedIn Support Member may neither have capacity nor skill to validate a foreign documents authenticity.
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Can’t. They won’t allow me to delete it without verifying my ID with a scan of my face and DL.
Facebook does that too I hear. They need ID to verify your id, but to delete they need id.
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That’s correct
Same thing for me in the US. They just didn’t provide a reason and their Tech Support will not respond.
This is what laws forbidding the youth from social media gets you. How many of you supported these laws based on the cynical arguments of tech and government that want to lock down the internet?
On today’s episode of “How can a a company be this extremely fucking incompetent?”
As someone currently unemployed, does anyone have any tips for finding jobs not through LinkedIn?
There are many platforms, I would search for those specific to your area of expertise
My university has a job board but it’s shit
Genuine question, what’s the privacy respecting alternative?
Like don’t ask for the passport?
It is a website, this info is not needed at this stage
I meant as a platform. Because Microsoft barely ever listens
