This morning (October 12), many popular Facebook profiles experienced a sharp drop in engagement. Along with this, follower counts suddenly showed numbers below 10,000.
For example, singer Sơn Tùng M-TP, who previously had nearly 1 million followers, now shows only 9,938. Streamer Độ Phùng (Độ Mixi), with over 2.5 million followers, now displays just 9,919. Famous singers like Đông Nhi and Bích Phương, who have millions of followers, also saw their counts dip below 10,000.
Many well-known influencers with millions of followers are now showing follower numbers under 10,000.
At first, some thought Facebook was cracking down on fake accounts. But even Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s profile, which usually has nearly 120 million followers, now shows only 9,927.
This issue only affects personal profiles, fan pages remain unaffected.
This drop is different from the 2016 incident when Facebook changed its API and removed fake accounts and likes, causing many users to lose followers.
Facebook has not yet explained the cause of this massive follower drop. Many believe it’s a display error because searching for celebrities on Facebook still shows the correct follower numbers, and detailed follower lists on profiles remain intact.
Since early 2022, Facebook has removed about 1.4 billion suspected fake accounts, according to its Community Standards Enforcement Report. Three months ago, 1.6 billion fake accounts were also taken down.
On its Transparency Center page, Facebook says its goal is to remove as many fake accounts as possible. These accounts are often created with malicious intent or represent businesses, organizations, or non-human entities.
Facebook prioritizes removing fake accounts that cause harm. Many of these accounts are used in spam campaigns and have financial motives.
About a month ago, Facebook users in Vietnam faced issues sending files and experienced delays with Messenger messages. These problems affected both the Facebook website and mobile app.
