Question from Marla: I recently had a falling out with one of my longtime Facebook friends.
She unfriended me and then put up a really long post saying nasty things about me that aren’t true.
It’s making me look really bad to my other friends.
Can you tell me if it’s possible to remove that post from her Timeline (and how to do it if it is)?
I’m afraid it’s going to cause me to lose a lot of my other friends too.
Rick’s answer: I’m very sorry this happened to you, Marla. I sincerely hope you and your former friend can find some way to regain your friendship.
To answer your question, there is no way for you to remove that post from your friend’s Timeline yourself because Facebook gives total control of every Timeline to the account owner, and nobody else.
But that being said, if you can see the post when you visit that user’s Timeline, you can report it.
A Facebook rep will check it out and if they believe the post violates Facebook’s Terms of Service they’ll remove it.
If you’re unable to see the post (i.e. if the post’s privacy is set to “Friends”) you can always ask a friend of yours who can see it to report it on your behalf.
Just be aware that even though you know the content of the post to be untrue (and perhaps even malicious), Facebook might not agree that the post violates their Terms of Service.
Unfortunately, if that turns out to be the case they’ll leave the post on your former friend’s Timeline.
It’s really easy to report a post on Facebook. Simply follow the steps below:
1 – Find the post you wish to report.
2 – Click (or tap) the Options icon at the top-right corner of the post (it looks like three dots).
3 – Click (or tap) Report Post.
4 – You should now see a list of possible reasons why you’re reporting the post. Select the reason that best matches the post in question.
5 – Follow the prompts as they appear until the report process is complete.
That’s all there is to it. You have now reported the malicious post to Facebook. What happens next is up to them.
Hopefully they’ll agree that the post should be removed, but if they don’t I’m afraid you’ve done all you can do on your end to have it taken down.
I hope this helps, Marla. Best of luck to you.
Bonus tip: On a related note, this post explains why there’s really no such thing as privacy on Facebook. Check it out.