If you get a Facebook message from a friend spinning you a story and asking you to send them money (for example, they’re had their wallet stolen, or they’re abroad and have just been mugged) then think twice. This is a popular type of identity fraud scam where a crook has managed to access your friends Facebook account (or they’ve cloned their account and tricked you into accepting a friend request – see previous point) and they’re trying to trick you into sending money, which you’ll never see again!
Never trust Facebook messages or text messages. Insist on speaking to your friend in person before you part with your cash.
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If you’ve ever received a message (or an email) from Facebook claiming that your account may be disabled and urging you to click a link to rectify the problem, then stop. This is most probably a phishing scam.
Phishing scams are designed to lure you to spoof login webpages that look and feel like the real login page, but are actually hosted on other websites. The link in the message will lead you to one of these spoof webpages and when you enter your username and password, then that information gets send straight to the cyber crook, who may very well now have access to your account.
Don’t click on the links in messages like this! Facebook don’t send messages over chat. Read more about Facebook phishing scams here.
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This scam also starts with a message and a link sent through Facebook chat. It will appear to have come from a friend, but beware, this is probably not the case. Your friend may have had their account compromised!
The idea of the scam is to bait you into clicking a link by piquing your curiosity. The message may read something like “OMG, is this you in the video?” or “OMG look what they’re saying about you!” or “haha look at your face in this pic“. Understandably this could certain grab our attention, but clicking the link could lead to dangerous consequences.
This scam can either lead you to a spoof login page, just like the scam above. Or it could trick you into downloading harmful files to your computer. For example it could ask you to download video update to what the “video that you’re in”. An update that will turn out to be malware.
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None of these scams are particularity new. It’s time to stop falling for them.
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