Sophos Cloud Optix
As of late things have been somewhat quiet on the Facebook scam front, but today we have seen a resurgence in free voucher scams targeting both Americans and Canadians.
A little more than a day ago a scam appeared purporting to be a free gift card for the famous Canadian coffee and doughnut shop Tim Hortons.
It asks you to like the page and to share it with your Facebook friends thanking Tim Hortons (or Timmies as it’s known to some Canadians) for the free coffee.
It would appear scamming Canadians was not enough for the folks behind this scam and within a day they had branched out to include Starbucks fans.
The Starbucks fraud proclaims to be a give away to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Seattle coffee giant.
It’s a tried and true formula for con-artists to get your to share their scam with your friends, and then lead you to a website asking you to divulge personal information.
These scams begin with asking you for your email address with some standard legal verbiage about being 18 years old and a resident of -insert country here-. They then proceed to lead you to another form asking you to disclose sensitive personal information.
Unfortunately thousands of Facebook users have been spreading the message, helping these criminals propagate their fraud. Innocent people thinking they might share a great deal with their friends are being used to social engineer those same friends.
Steer clear of these frauds and warn your friends that not even a cup of coffee comes at no cost. While both Starbucks and Tim Hortons may be trustworthy brands and offer occasional specials, be sure to only participate in contests from their own websites or stores.
Make sure that you keep informed about the latest scams spreading fast across Facebook and other internet attacks. Join the Sophos page on Facebook, where over 100,000 people regularly share information on threats and discuss the latest security news.
Thank you Sophos!!!
So what do you do if you've already done it? I didnt give them any personal info – it only asked me share the link and provide a comment. What is the next step?
Delete the message from your feed, warn your friends, remove any suspicious "Likes" from your profile, mark it as spam so it might ping up the Facebook security team's radar.
Is there any way that it could infect you or hack your account if you only shared the link (and subsequently deleted it)?
I already did it and got charged $10 by some guessology people who supposedly aren't even connected 🙁
i've done it… and gave my work address… i'm so stupid…. consequences?
I provided my real address, birthday and a email used only for coupons,Everything else was fake….am I still okay?
thank you common sense.. I've been saying this for years, stupid people should NOT use the internet.
What happens if you gave them personal information like a phone number and mailing address?! Help.
We don't know what they plan to do with that information.
What if you clicked on the link, but did not share the link, comment or enter any personal information?
You should be fine. On this occasion.
But take better care next time – because next time, it could be that the link you click on points to malware.
lol I can't believe people still believe this stuff….
What happens is, if you put in an email address they spam you, if you put in a phone number you get a bunch of telemarketing calls from pakistan. I have been using that link and putting in the information of people I don’t like so they get spam and bs phone calls. I suggest you all do the same.
I fell for it too-put in my address and cell phone-but then that information is pretty readily available so I don't know if much is really compromised.
Yuk…good job I boycott Starbucks then…hate their coffee anyway.
Erm this ones going to be difficult as Starbucks DO do this often …
I am so over gulible people liking scams all the time. I now just laugh at them.
How about the one for a $100 gift certificate? How many of those do you reckon they’re giving away?
Kathy, I have 2 $5 Starbucks gift cards the company gave away FREE
why do you post an article from last year? Or is this a typo?
Christine, it’s re-appearing on Facebook. Sophos note that in their post.
Christine, they indicated in the post they’d seen this before. Just letting you know it’s surfaced – again.
They are posting it again because it is being spread around again
Who is Tim Horton?
Who is still falling for this crap?
Ima T drinker. Tea times eh.
darn, fooled again!
Look out
Starbucks coffee is lousy, why would anyone enter that scam?
Be warned
@ David- I agree with you. I’ve been threatened, my family has been as well by this one guy, same account everytime. I have reported him so many times as well as other people and fb hasn’t done anything about it…. They need to really look into reports and stuff… Especially when it’s over and over again.
thats terrible. i dont agree that peeps are stupid. peeps are stressed cos of hard times and can be vunrable. we all been “stupid” at some point, but the peeps who con peeps are VERY good at what they do, so if we have fell for it, we shudnt be so hard on ourselves,… i am verrry caredful ,always warning folks… but when i have been tired and stressed out, i did click on somemat bad…. just be careful what u click on, .always, or like someone sed. go to web page/facebook page. and yes starbook do give away coffee, to get u hooked. yuk yuk lol.
I cry everytime my friends post it
Seems legit. I’m going to sign up for it. Hoping my good luck streak continues, just earlier today I was the 122324 visitor to a site and I won a FREE LAPTOP! All I had to do was to give them my passport details!
Just about to download something called “Bonzai Buddy” too!
#arepeopelstillin2004
I’ve been getting these for several days. My motto: delete, delete, delete..
I have no clue how I got hacked but it wont go away! I don't have any facebook apps at all, no suspicious "likes," my norton anti virus is working and up to date, and I keep changing my password and facebook settings. My account keeps inviting people to get these gift cards (and posting other things) every few days. I report it to facebook every time and it keeps happening. I never even "liked" or accepted anything starbucks related or anything suspicious at all that I can remember. Help!
In the past some folks have reported that they had a malicious plugin in their browser. You may wish to check for unauthorized plugins/extensions/addons.
Anne Marie, have you checked under your 'Events' on Facebook? That's what it did to a friend of mine. She had to delete it there.