14 DAY TRIAL // Facebook scammers are luring users into signing up for premium rate services with promises of a video showing a guy killing his room mate after playing Black Ops.
The new spam messages, which, according to security researchers from GFI Software, are rapidly spreading on the social networking site, read: "TODAY ONE GUY KILLED HER ROOM MATE WHILE PLAYING A BLACK OPS GAME IN NETWORK. | LIVE DEATH VIDEO CAUGHT ON CAMERA ? http://www.bit.ly/[censored]"
Leaving aside the fact that a guy can't kill "her" anything, it's confusing that the alleged murder happened "while" playing Black Ops in network.
"Black Ops" refers to "Call of Duty: Black Ops," the seventh installment in the Call of Duty game series, which was released this month.
In this context, the spam message could be interpreted to mean that the killing happened in a game, which, of course, wouldn't be a big deal at all.
In the end, this ambiguousness might actually work in the scam's favor, prompting users to click on the link in order to see what really happened.
This would take them to a page displaying a picture of a guy with a clearer message that reads: "OMG! This Guy Killed his Room mate aftre Playing Black Ops games in New York ! Watch Live Death Video Caught on Cam | CLICK ON BELOW PIC TO CONTINUE...."
This, of course, is just a lure and there's no video of any killing whatsoever. Clicking on the picture as instructed prompts a permissions request dialog from a rogue Facebook app called "Shock news."
The application wants access to post on people's walls. Allowing it to do this is a very bad idea and will cause users to unknowingly send spam from their accounts.
The app prompt is followed by a so called "human authentication" test, which requires people to take an IQ quiz that tries to sign them up for a $9.99/month SMS service.
If you fell victim to this scam, go to Account > Privacy Settings > Applications and Websites and revoke the permissions for the rogue app. Also remove any spam messages posted on your wall.