Why does Facebook Graph API say my account is non-active?

Question

We have some code that uses Facebook Open Graph API to display some posts on our home page. It was originally developed by a previous developer and I rewrote it in ASP.NET MVC for our home page (where before it was PHP which I believe was loaded in an iframe). At that time, I used the app ID and secret that were left to me. This has functioned fine for a couple of years. This afternoon, we started getting an error back on our site: "Access to this data is temporarily disabled for non-active accounts due to changes we are making to the Facebook Platform".

No sweat. I figured I just needed to update our ID and secret. Unfortunately, no one seems to remember the user ID that was in control of that app ID. No sweat. I'll make my own. Unfortunately, any ID and secret I use to access posts -- even my own posts on a page totally not related to work -- returns the same access error. I can get name or cover or some other fields, but as soon as I request any posts, I get the error.

Here's an example of what I'm trying:

https://graph.facebook.com/MyCompanyName?fields=cover,name,likes,link,posts.limit(5){created_time,message,link,type,full_picture,picture,source,icon}&access_token=bunchofnumbers|bunchofnumbersandletters

I am aware of the status post at https://developers.facebook.com/status/issues/205942813488872/, but I think I must be doing something wrong since I can't even create new appIDs to get posts with.

Why does Facebook Graph API say my account is non-active?

Thanks.

Solution 1

Please read this article:

Mark Zuckerberg apologises for Facebook's 'mistakes' over Cambridge Analytica

Cambridge University researcher named Aleksandr Kogan had used an app to extract the information of more than 50 million people, and then transferred it to Cambridge Analytica for commercial and political use.

So facebook is changing its policies so that the personal data could be made more secure.

Until then you cant do anything about it.

Solution 2

I solved the problem on my website by removing the events from the fetched fields list

Solution 3

We started seeing this same error message on our platform today. I think there are a few things going on that all tie together:

1. As others have mentioned, there have been rapid and major responses by Facebook to increase data protection and privacy in light of the Cambridge Analytica incident. From what I understand, the bad actors exploited the ability access the data of Users (via the graph) that the app did not have an active, first-party relationship with. So, sort of like how "6 degrees of separation" would get you the whole planet, the 1 degree of separation on the few-hundred-thousand Users that connected with the app directly gave the app access to roughly 50 Million users...or something like that. FB is doing what they can to lock that stuff down now, big time.
2. The specific cause of your error is that something you're asking for in the fields parameter makes a leap (from the either the myCompany or the OAuth'd User/App whose access_token you are using) to a related item/items that FB now deems must have an "active" first-party/direct relationship with your Company/App/User in order to access. This is why you see the somewhat cryptic "non-active accounts" mentioning. I think they really mean that it's not "active with you or your app".

I'm not sure which one of the fields you request is at fault, but some trial-and-error will lead you to it. For us, it was clear: we were asking for the Members of all the Groups that User had access to. We didn't need that, so we cut it out and the error went away.

Solution 4

Facebook today updated the term and conditions https://developers.facebook.com/docs/graph-api/changelog/breaking-changes/?translation&hc_location=ufi#groups-4-4

Solution 5

Right now I am working with Facebook Open Graph API. And I was having this error every time I wanted to access/get the member (and their basic info) of the groups I am Admin.

{
  "error": {
 "message": "(#200) Access to this data is temporarily disabled for non-active accounts due to changes we are making to the Facebook Platform",
"type": "OAuthException",
"code": 200,
"fbtrace_id": "Byueyj6MtkoIx"
 }
}

In between trial and error @JoshChristy was getting all the desired results! And after couple hours of research we discovered that facebook recognize some account as "non-active" and some "active" (I don't know based on what!) because I am pretty much active in facebook. So, if you are getting this error that means you are not active enough for facebook ;)

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Comments

[Denis Angell]

Oh wow! I'm sorry man! I was testing and so It helped me solve a problem. Good Luck!

[Denis Angell]

What scopes do you have btw? newsroom.fb.com/news/2018/03/cracking-down-on-platform-abuse

[Daan]

I do not know if this is a real solution to this problem. But it fixed my immediate issue!

[A. Dabak]

No, it is not a solution, but it make my website works again, until a better solution comes

[Kisded Szabi - CodeRevolution]

I tried this, but for me, it has the same error result even if I leave only 'name' for fields.

[Brad]

This answer adds no information than what was stated in the error message, and is not helpful.

[Zarathustra]

@A.Dabak thanks for the hint, but events are all what I want - fail :D

[AmitP]

FB is total BS! so long to that promise from Mark to "not brake API's during two years" @#$

[pavel]

Still not working, and I don't call for events, etc. Works for nothing, eg. simple /feed?fields=name. Any more info when it becomes to work, or how to run than anyway?

[Tobias]

@Denis: What do you mean exactly with limiting? I have a app which is in development mode and of course I want to check if everything is working before I change to production. Will it be not possible to fetch facebook-posts with a app in development mode?

[Tobias]

Ok, I found the paragraph which was posted by David Heckro below. This answered my question.

[Hendrra]

I would like to download information about events only, no personal data and I still get this notification. Am I doing something wrong?