14 DAY TRIAL // Two new scams that prey on people's curiosity are quickly making their way through Facebook. One claims a mother went to jail because she took a picture of her son, while the other promises to reveal the reason that might lead to the shutdown of McDonald's.
“OMG!! Guys, you have to see this: This mother went to jail for taking this pic of her son! ---> [URL]” one of the spam messages reads. Clicking on the link takes users to a rogue Facebook profile with a name similar to the message.
This profile has a page called 'SEE HERE!' which instructs users to “Like” it in order to see the intriguing picture. Furthermore, to entice people even more it promises that “Your jaw will drop to the floor!”
Liking the page will get users no closer to seeing a image and will instead ask them to spread more spam, this time by posting the original message on their wall for all their family and friends to see. Users who are gullible enough to accept this, will finally get a link to allegedly see the elusive picture.
Unfortunately, following it doesn't have the expected result and prompts users to take one of four surveys as a “security check.” Taking a survey is definitely not a good idea as there are high chances of ending up being billed for some sort of premium service and compromised personal information.
The second scam is almost identical in concept as the first, but uses a different lure. In this case the spam message reads “OMG!! McDonalds might soon shut down because of this, you have to see this! --> [URL]” and no, it's no better than the first. If you are a victim of any of them make sure to delete the rogue messages from your profile and remove the fake pages from your Like list.
“I really feel like despairing that the general public will ever learn to avoid dodgy links like this. Far too many people are prepared to endorse and share links on Facebook without properly thinking about what they are doing. In this case they're doing it before they have any clue about what lies behind the page,” Graham Cluley, senior security at antivirus vendor Sophos, commented.
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