14 DAY TRIAL // Facebook scammers are exploiting Hurricane Irene news in order to trick people into spamming their friends and participate in surveys.
Scammers don't miss any chance to make money, even if that means to profit from a natural disaster, a tragic death, a major holiday or some other event of international importance.
Hurricane Irene which recently hit the Caribbean and the eastern coast of North America is no different and security researchers from Trend Micro have already observed scams using it as lure on Facebook.
Victims are spreading messages that read "VIDEO SHOCK – Hurricane Irene New York kills All" which contain a link to a spoofed Facebook page.
The page displays a video player thumbnail, but clicking anywhere on it asks users to share the message with their friends before being allowed to see the content.
The messages are in Italian, proof that Facebook scams are becoming increasingly localized in an attempt to increase the pool of potential victims.
After sharing the spam message on their walls users are asked to take one of several surveys allegedly as a security verification. These surveys earn commissions for scammers through affiliate marketing programs and some of them can end up costing users money.
People who fell for this scam should immediately remove the shared messages from their walls and should unlike the page. Users are advised to only watch videos on reputed news websites and refuse to provide their personal information, send messages or participate in surveys, for access to such content.
This sort of scams have been circulating on Facebook for the past couple of years and despite the company's best efforts there's no end in sight for them. This has pushed some security vendors to come up with Facebook-oriented security solutions, like BitDefender's safego.