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This tutorial is designed to teach you how to stay clear of Survey Scams on facebook. The survey scam is one of the most wide spread scams seen on facebook currently. They may appear to have many different bait massages, but they all run the same scam routine on the victims that fall for them. They may appear as messages posted by a friend, in your news feed or on your wall. If you make the mistake of believing in these types of the messages, many of which will be shown to you in this tutorial, and follow through by clicking any of the links within these types of messages, you will be redirected through an elaborate ruse. This ruse filled with rogue application drop pages, request for permission screens, make pretend content and fake human verification processes, has been designed by a scam artist to screw you over. If you participate in the scammers games, you will be use as a tool to spam your facebook friends and led down a dark tunnel which ends in the scam artist making off with a quick buck for your lack of knowledge and apparent naivety. You may also end up with a virus infected computer or your identity stolen. Please take the time to arm yourself with the knowledge necessary to avoid becoming a victim of this scam process. Also take the time to share this knowledge with your friends.
1 - The Spam
Rule number one: DO NOT CLICK THE LINKS in ANY post on facebook that look like or even similar to the posts shown in the photo slideshow below. You will be asked to do things which can and will put your facebook profile and the personal information in your profile at risk. The Photo Slideshow below will expose you to a variety of different types of messages you may see posted by friends to your news feed or in other public places around facebook. I encourage you to take the time to familiarize yourself with them. It will help keep you from making the mistake of clicking on anything like them.
Remember DO NOT CLICK!!! if you see these
ANYWHERE ON FACEBOOK,
POSTED BY ANYONE!!!
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OR ANYTHING SIMILAR
2 - The Scam
Most of the posts above are designed to fool you into thinking your friend or someone else has just had some type of shocking, great or lucrative experience on facebook. They have either saw, read or did something amazing, or gotten something like facebook currency, game currency or some other "pay for" item for free. Many of the messages may even claim a person has just been able to see all of the users which have visited, viewed or peeked at their facebook profile. The truth is they have not done any of the above things, and they more then likely didn't actually post this type of message.
Here is what happen.
Once a person takes the bait and clicks on one of the links given in post similar to the ones you've just seen above, they are more than likely taken to a Application Drop Page like the ones show in the Photo Slideshow below. There are several examples given, take the time to familiarize yourself with them. That way if you ever see something similar, you'll know to do. "Navigate Away From The Page Immediately".
Part 2 of The Scam: Rogue Facebook Application Drop Pages.
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Once a person reaches one of these Application Drop Pages, which will differ for each scam, they are shown a rather professional looking image in most cases. Scam artist use these pages and images to relay more information about the particular ruse they are trying to promote. They may use text and or pictures from legit sources such as: facebook, Zynga Games or other well known entities to try to trick you into believing the content promised is or will be legit. In many cases these ruses pull headline stories from various press release throughout the year. It's not uncommon to find them using a celebrity mishap or sex tape as the bait. At this point if a "Mark" believes the ruse, he or she will click were told to on the image or page. Usually believing that was all they needed to do to see or get whatever was promised. However, that action actually leads them deeper into the next part of the scam, which is installing the Rogue Application on their facebook profile. Below are a few examples of these "Application Install" or "Request For Permission" screens.
Part 3 of The Scam: Installing The Rogue Application.
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The Application Request For Permission or (App Install Screen) examples you have just viewed, are the part of the scam intended to spread a message similar to the examples from The Spam section of this tutorial. These are the typical types of screens you will be shown to install any facebook application. The difference here is that these are for rogue applications. Scam artist develop these types of apps to use the requested profile access permissions for the sole purposes of posting spam messages to your facebook wall and reaping your profile information.
Note: This is why you should always investigate any application you plan to install on your facebook profile. Once you grant an application the requested permission by clicking Allow, it has the permission to act on your facebook profile as you. It can pull your profile info, post to your wall, access and manage the pages you administrate, email you, your friends, read your news feed and a whole bunch of other stuff on your behalf. You must always read these screens. Not doing so, can expose your account in ways you don't want.
Once a victim impulsively clicks Allow on this type of screen, without their knowledge the rogue application post the spam message or messages to the victims wall. This message also ends up replicated to all of the victims friends news feeds. (Hence You see a message like the one in The Spam Section appear from them.) In most cases the victim is then finally taken to see the real reason they are there. They may be told at this point, they need to complete an age verification process, human verification process or simply shown a list of activities they need to complete before they can access this shocking material or freebie. These are what is know as surveys. Below you will see some examples of this Survey Scam process. Take the time to look them over. They will help you identify this scam process on facebook and across the web.
Part 4 of the scam. The End Game - Survey Scam.
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What you've just seen above is not part of facebook or part of any verification process. These screens are designed to trick the victim into completing a survey or downloading a product by telling them the promised content can not be accessed till they do. Most of the time the promised content is never provided even after you've jumped through the scammers hoops. The real reason why the victim must complete this step is so that the scam artist can get paid. The scam artist can net a $1 or more for each completed survey or a commission for each downloaded product. The surveys themselves are simply designed in many cases to glean email addresses or as much personal information about the victim as possible. Providing these types of surveys this extra information will open the victim up to spam or even Identity Theft. In many cases the products offer for download will infect the victims computer with Ad-ware, Spyware or a Trojan Horse virus.
It is important that you never hand over any personal information, such as: email addresses, cell number, name, home address or credit card numbers, to these types of scams. If you do, you are simply setting yourself up to be spammed or worst. Identity theft is big business and handing over some of the info these bogus surveys ask for, will make you a victim of that business. If you have made the mistake of handing over a credit card number, you should call your bank or credit provider as soon as possible to have them remove or dispute the charges that have or maybe made to the card. If you've given your cell number to any of these types of Scams, it is important that you call your cell carrier ASAP to have any charges you may receive stopped. If you begin to receive unsolicited phone calls, you should take note of the calls, record names and numbers, then report the calls to the FCC or other proper authorities..
It is important that you never hand over any personal information, such as: email addresses, cell number, name, home address or credit card numbers, to these types of scams. If you do, you are simply setting yourself up to be spammed or worst. Identity theft is big business and handing over some of the info these bogus surveys ask for, will make you a victim of that business. If you have made the mistake of handing over a credit card number, you should call your bank or credit provider as soon as possible to have them remove or dispute the charges that have or maybe made to the card. If you've given your cell number to any of these types of Scams, it is important that you call your cell carrier ASAP to have any charges you may receive stopped. If you begin to receive unsolicited phone calls, you should take note of the calls, record names and numbers, then report the calls to the FCC or other proper authorities..
3 - What else can happen.
Though the survey scam is the most common end game to clicking on or following links given in The Spam messages above, it is not the only end game. Below is a list of other unsavory things the can happen to victims who follow the links given in these types of spam messages on facebook.
- Following the links in these messages could lead you to websites off of facebook, which have been created with malicious code in them. This code could force your computer to download Viruses or Trojans designed to either take control of your computer or to gather personal information like: Site login information, banking information or credit card numbers. As well as they could try to trick you into believing you need to install what is known as Fake Anti-Viruses or FakeAV's and other fake system utilities..
- The links could also take you to fake login pages or Phishing websites. While on these sites you maybe tricked into believing you are on another legit website and asked to provide your user account information to that site. The site is simply designed to store that information and provide it to the creator, so that him or her can take over your account and use it for their own purpose.
- You could end up being the victim of a clickjacking attack. In a clickjacking attack a cyber criminal could trick you into revealing confidential information or allowing him to take over control of your computer. You would be unaware of the process, because the page you would see, would look innocent to you.
- You could unwillingly take part in Likejacking. Likejacking is a facebook-enabled clickjacking attack that tricks users into clicking links that mark the clicked site as one of your Facebook "likes." These likes then show up on your profile and, of course, in your Facebook News Feed where your friends can see the link and click it. This allows the vicious, viral cycle to continue through their walls and their friends walls.
Damage Control ( For those who have fell victim. )
If you have fell victim to any of these Survey Scams, you need to clean up your facebook profile immediately. You can do this by simply removing the posts made to your wall by the rogue app, then removing plus blocking the rogue application which is associated with the particular scam. This will ensure that you do not continue to assist the scam artist in spreading his ruse to your friends and even further throughout the facebook network. If you've downloaded and installed any programs to your computer as a result of one of these scams, it is advised that you run a full virus scan on your computer immediately. At the link provide below you will find helpful information to assist in these task, if you are not sure what to do..
Stay Virus Free
The Scam Text + [ Link ]
I honestly cried after seeing this. OMG i nearly cried when i saw this. This poor girl caught by Father while stippin nake-d over the webcam, Look what happen to her! Miley cyrus doing hot stuff in this video. wow, this is as low as one can go. OMG!... This girl killed herself after her dad posted this to her wall: Amazing how such a harmless prank could cause something so bad! Who are your profile creepers? Amazing ! I've just seen who STALKS me on Facebook! You can TOO! :Dwow, this is nuts, how could she?OMG!!! This is so sad :( A teenage girl killed herself because she forgot to harvest her FarmVille Crop! Read the full story here: Poor Girl. This girl killed herself after her dad posted on her wall - I DEMAND DAD TO BE KILLED. Hey guys, you must see that terrible fact, a girl suicide, the cause is her FB wall...OMG.. YOU WILL CRY TODAY AFTRE WATCHING THIS HORRIBLE THING HAPPEND IN CALIFORNIA...!!---> OMG she is so busted!! Dad Catches Daughter on Webcam!Girl caught cheating.Kid getting Shot on Google Earth: Street View. wow, this is degrading .. You will not eat KFC after seeing this:Honestly I cried after I read this, poor girl - omfg, this airing of Jeremy Kyle had to be cut mid way, Jeremy actually flips out and goes on violent rampage! OMG! Her botfriend dies in her arms right before her eyes. The car hits them while they kiss. It's heartbreaking. You must see this: I am never gona txt again after seein this.....here is my sercet pciz I was talking of last you hvae to singup for a paswsord. wow, how low can you go? here is the sxei picutres I took last nihgt. you msut singup for a psas wrod. here is the sercet phoots I took last emial. you hvae to singup for a paswsord. Holy cr*p. Please drive safely, what a horrible accident: Julianna Hough's Banned Sexually Explicit Video.
