Get Gephardt helps Morgan man locked out of LinkedIn account
Oct 8, 2024, 10:33 PM
MORGAN — Matt Lewandoski is working his way through business school. And a big part of that, he said, is the social media website LinkedIn.
“There’s all these things that they want you to do,” he said. “Update your resume, do internships, have a LinkedIn profile.”
Now, Lewandoski has that LinkedIn profile, or at least, he thought he had one.
“My LinkedIn account is restricted,” he said.
Yeah, a while back, LinkedIn asked Lewandoski to verify his identity. He uploaded a photo of his driver’s license. But LinkedIn didn’t accept the document. Maybe because his name is Matthew but he goes by Matt? He doesn’t know. But what he does know is he’s now trapped in a loop.
“I go to create a support ticket and the first thing it asks me to do is to log in,” he said.
But he can’t create a support ticket because he can’t log in. And he can’t log in because he can’t verify his identity. He said he’s been going around in circles on this for several months now. Worried this frustrating, never-ending loop could hurt his chances of landing good internships and eventually jobs, Lewandoski decided to see if I could help.
“Bottom line – I’m just hoping there’s a fix,” he said.
I reached out to LinkedIn on his behalf, not through customer service but through its public relations team. A spokesperson responded, “In this case, we made a mistake.”
A mistake that is now rectified. Lewandoski said that very day he was given access back to his LinkedIn account. Still, he said LinkedIn needs to fix its verification process.
“I love that they make you verify who you are because it’s important that you know who you are linking with – but the additional support is needed by human beings,” he said.
I asked LinkedIn about the robot loop Matt Lewandoski got stuck in, and what someone else in that situation should do. LinkedIn told me the website has “a combination of automatic and people-led protections,” and will “continue to work towards building an experience that meets the needs of our members and customers.”