14 DAY TRIAL // People who enjoy a meal at McDonald’s may be tempted to click on the links that began flooding Twitter in the past hours, promising free gift cards. Like in many cases, there are no free prizes, only a malicious operation that targets the digital assets of unsuspecting Internet users.
I don’t know if I should call this latest scam amusing or scary. I say this because once the link from the tweets is clicked, the victim is taken to a websites that says they’re all out of gift cards, but they can offer some adult content instead.
A big red Join Now button results in multiple redirects, the user eventually being taken to an adult dating site, Trend Micro researchers report.
While some may say that adult dating sites are just like a social network for grown-ups, the manner in which this particular website is promoted makes it malicious.
First, individuals are spammed on Twitter and offered free gift certificates, and then they’re taken to some location that offers something entirely different. If we look-up in the dictionary the term malicious spam attack, we would probably see a picture of this scam.
This latest scam that targets McDonald’s may be inspired by the news about a mysterious Santa Claus who donated McDonald’s gift cards worth a few hundred dollars to a homeless shelter.
Users are advised to take a close look at a tweet before clicking on it. Usually these scams are easy to identify because they never give too many details.
If you see a bunch of Twitter usernames followed by something like “free giftcard” or “McDonalds gift card,” you can be certain that you’re being targeted by a spam campaign that one way or the other earns the crooks tons of money.
The schemes may change slightly, once the masterminds that run them notice they’re not as efficient as when they were first launched, but because they’re powered by bots, the changes are never too big.