POF : Does anyone else get locked out their accounts or just me?
I know everyones first thought is that i did something and got banned but I had my original account and was having a great conversation then the next hour it logged me out and refuses to recognize my log in info, it also wont send me the email for reseting the password. I got frustrated and made a new one in hopes i could re engage with the person i was talking to and the same thing happened in a shorter time frame. For the sake of testing i made one on my phone, and a separate test account on pc and both logged me out and dont recognize my info. Is this site/app just a hoax or what is happening?
By. equalsolstice
I have had the exact same problem this last week.
I have no idea if it’s been hacked, or compromised or what.
I can’t get into my account, and password reset link does not work. I sent them emails, and i keep getting automated responses. Seems useless to even try to communicate with POF staff.
Was your original account new? They are trying to weed out the bots, and one of the behaviors (from what I’ve experienced personally) is that if you sign up, log in, start searching, and immediately start sending messages (because, it’s a dating app, why would you want to start sending messages? /s), they see that as a bot.
Other things are 1) no VPN and 2) no adblockers.
My recommendation is to create a new acct and immediately HIDE the acct (that keeps other bots from spamming the shit out of you) and wait a day or so, and unhide your acct (if you so choose), and start off easy. Don’t message every cute person you see. Pick a couple, send a message. Wait a bit, try another couple. After a couple of days, you can go crazy and message anyone you want.
POF is a shitty platform, even if they have the market share to say otherwise. They are the « blackberry » of online dating. They had the market and are doing their best to become irrelevant in their own market.
You got banned. When a ban happens your account is removed, so that is why you get errors not recognizing your information. When you are banned, your IP is banned as well. So if you create a new account, they will remove that account as well. Your pictures also become flagged too. I’ve tested it out, use a different IP and email but same pictures, your account will be removed.
Bans happen often, the entire site is auto moderated. Nobody actually looks at bans. Get enough blocks, you’re banned. Send too many or too few messages, you’re banned. Have one of the black listed words on your profile or in a message, you’re banned. Have a picture that someone else doesn’t like and reports it, you’re banned.
People can defend the site and say the only way to get banned is to be an asshole to other members. Not true. No moderation system is perfect, and POF’s is like Craigslist where all it takes is a certain number of reports or blocks, and poof. And people who have been around on POF long enough know about that and know how to abuse that to their favor.