14 DAY TRIAL // Facebook users are advised to be on the lookout for posts advertising a cheat for Social Empires, the popular online strategy game.
Bitdefender experts say the posts are designed to lure users to a website where they’re asked to complete all sorts of bogus surveys and hand over personal information. Unfortunately, over 135,000 internauts have already fallen for it.
The scam posts read something like this: “Awesome! Social Empires Cheat GOT 99999990 GOLD, FOOD, WOOD, STONE and 10000 Cash 100% Working try now!”
When Facebook members click on the link from this post, they’re taken to a recently created Blogspot blog where they’re instructed to share the message on five fan pages that promote cheats and hacks.
Once this is done, based on their location, victims are presented with a page that asks them to complete a survey. To make everything more genuine-looking, the logos of several IT security firms are displayed.
As always, there are no cheats, hacks or prizes. Instead, victims help the cybercrooks in promoting their scam pages. In addition, the scammers make some money every time the surveys are completed, not to mention the fact that they end up collecting personal data that they can use for other malicious purposes.
The names of popular video games are often leveraged in online scams. That’s why users are advised to be extra careful before liking and sharing posts on Facebook, or before accepting to take part in surveys.
Also, try to avoid handing over information on websites you don’t trust. For instance, by entering your phone number, a piece of information that’s usually asked in such scams, users end up unwittingly subscribing to paid mobile services that are not easy to get rid of, especially if you’re less tech savvy.