Facebook Affiliate Marketing Scam Abuses the Target Brand

Security researchers from Sophos warn that scammers are using a fake Target promotion to lure in Facebook users onto affiliate marketing websites. The spam messages promise the opportunity to shop for free at Target for a week.

The rogue messages read "Target Week, SHOP For Free This Week Only!!" and include links to an external website. To entice users into clicking on the link as soon as possible, the message also claims that the "Promotion Ends Shortly."

The first landing page in this scam informs users they need a special gift card to take part in the promotion. To obtain this card, they are required to perform a few steps, the first of which involves hitting a Facebook Like button, which will propagate the spam message through their profile.

The second step involves signing up for a different offer on another website. This also asks users to provide some personal details about themselves like real name, email address, gender, age and the country they reside in.

After users freely hand out all this information that will most likely later be used for email spamming purposes, they are presented with even more special deals. In order for these offers to appeal to each individual arriving on this page, they are tailored according to the details inputted in the previous form.

"This is a typical bait-and-switch scam, where you are lured in with the promise of one thing – in this case, a week's free shopping at Target – but are then presented with a completely different series of offers," Paul Ducklin, Sophos' head of technology for the Asia Pacific region, explains. According to him, thousands of Facebook users have already fallen for the trick.

Unfortunately, despite Facebook's best efforts to prevent spam, this type of affiliate marketing scams constantly find their way onto the social networking website. Just a few days ago, security researchers from Zscaler warned about a similar campaign promising free iPads for people who were willing to participate in a beta testing program.

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