Spotting Facebook Phishing Scams
Have you received an email similar to the below that sent you into a panic about your Facebook Business Page?
Frantically you click on that link ready to appeal and are sent to a Facebook Group Post that asks you to click off the Facebook domain to submit your appeal.
DO 👏 NOT 👏 CLICK 👏THAT 👏 LINK!!!!!
You’re about to get phished and lose your Facebook Business Page.
Read on to learn how to spot a Facebook Phishing scam and protect yourself and your business from the ne’er-do-wells of the internet.
Look At The “From” Email Closely
Phishers are really good at creating emails that look like they are from a legit domain. Instead of mike@facebook.com they could use mike@faceb00k.com or mike@faebook.com. Something that at a glance looks legit but when you really look you see the character difference.
Unfortunately today’s scammers are even more advanced and can use nefarious email spoofing programs to accurately mimic a domain like Facebook so even this check could get passed and it still be a scammer. That leads us to step two.
Never Click On The Link In The Email
If you think there is even a 0.001% that the email might be legit open a separate browser and login to your Facebook account directly to check and see if the alert is also shown in your account. Similar to how an email can be spoofed, a link can look like it says facebook.com/appeals but actually redirect you to dirtypiratehacker.com/steal-your-info. Within the email body if you hove your cursor over the link you can see where the link actually resolves to - if it is a bunch of random numbers and characters you’ve got a scammer on your hands. Delete the email and go about your day.
Facebook Never Preemptively Warns You, They Just Suspend You
Probably the easiest way to tell its a scam email is that if it was legit you would already be suspended. Facebook doesn’t warn you that you’re about to be suspended - they just do it. The Scammer is relying on your fear of losing your page to do something hasty and unreasonable and start sharing your info with them. Stay rational and remind yourself Facebook doesn’t send warning shots!
BONUS SCAM TIP
While we’re outing Facebook Scams let me go over one of our biggest pet peeve scams on Facebook. While it isn’t going to lead to your business page getting stolen it could lead to you getting duped by something later down the line.
We’re talking about posts that are pure engagement bait. You know the ones we’re talking about:
Bet you can’t name an animal that with the letter ‘g’ in it
Comment “Yes!” to win this crazy vacation
We’re Spirit Airlines and we’re giving away $10 flights to everyone who comments “Me” on this post
Bill Gates will donate $100 to Children’s Hospitals for every Like this post gets
With these engagement posts you really want to look at the page behind the post. Often times they are made to look legit but if you go to the page they are clearly not that company. Most recently we saw one with “Southwest Airlines” promising free airfare to every person who commented on their post. I clicked on their profile and this supposed major airline only had around 1,000 followers and had only posted twice in the entire history of their page. HUGE RED FLAG 🥵
What’s the harm in commenting or liking you may ask? If its a scam then I just never win anything no big deal. The big deal happens when that page one day changes from Southwest Airlines to Non-FDA Approved Fake Weight Loss Drug page. Since you engaged with their old page you now can fall under their engagement audience and they can directly target you with ads. Since you’ve already shown that you’re not a skeptical person by clicking on their free airfare post they know you’re more likely to be interested in some sort of scammy product provided they make outrageous but great sounding claims.
So in closing to avoid scams on Facebook: check those emails, don’t click links, Facebook doesn’t warn you, and never comment on anything 😁
