Instagram users are reporting a surge of spammy adverts on their newsfeed, seemingly posted by friends, offering large discounts on designer fashion wear.
90% of a pair of quality Ray-Ban sunglasses? That sounds like a deal that’s too good to be true. There’s a reason for that. It is too good to be true.
It’s a scam. Yes, even if one of your closest, most trustworthy friends posted it onto their Instagram account, it’s still a scam. Head to the website the advert is peddling and you can expect one of two things …
1. The website will steal your payment information when you head to the checkout
2. The website will send you a cheap knock-off, counterfeit product (and probably still steal your payment information for good measure.)
So basically, ignore the adverts, and let your friend who posted the advert know what happened, because one way or the other, their account has been compromised.
But how?
If it’s your account posted the spammy adverts, your account has been compromised.
If it was a friend posting the adverts, their account has been compromised.
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When a social media account gets compromised, be it Instagram or an account on another social media platform, its typically three things that could be the cause.
1. You’ve unwittingly given your password to a crook (usually through a phishing scam).
2. You’ve installed a social media app (both Facebook and Instagram support third party apps) that’s posting as the account owner
3. Malware. Urgh.
Phishing is the most common method. This means the account owner clicked a link, which most likely bought up the login page for the social media website (e.g. Instagram.) Only it isn’t!! It just looks like the login page. It’s actually a spoof website. And once you enter the password and username, poof! That information is sent straight to the crook, who has access to the account (providing 2FA isn’t enabled.)
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If that’s the case, change your password! The spam adverts should stop. If they don’t, also follow the advice below about social media apps.
Secondly, check for social media apps that may be posting on your behalf. On Instagram, head to https://www.instagram.com/accounts/manage_access/ on a web browser. This lists all the authorised apps that can access (and potentially post from) your account. Don’t recognise one? Remove it.
Thirdly, if none of that seems to be the cause, you may have a malware infection that has either worked out how to post spam from a logged in social media account or its stealing your password and transmitting it to a crook. Installing antivirus from a reputable company is the next step if that’s the case.
Following these steps should stop the problem. A few tips worth noting to stop this happening in the future is to never install social media apps you don’t trust, enable 2FA (yes, this is supported on Instagram) as that stops most phishing scams in their tracks and always run regular antivirus scans on your device. Also, if you click a link that then asks for your password and username, check the web address to make sure you’re on the website that you should be on and not a spoof website.