5 Viral Facebook Scams of 2011

When asked about a platform that connects millions of people, globally the unanimous answer was - Facebook. This doesn't mean that Twitter, LinkedIn and likewise go unnoticed, but Facebook has emerged as a more social friendly platform that opens up to vivid interests of people, like gaming, business, music, photography or for simply staying in touch. Obviously, having millions of people, all under one roof would make a pretty appetizing feast for malicious cyber criminals to prey on. For instance, we often want what’s not accessible to us and this was clearly proved by Facebook scammers last year, who went on a spree, posting intriguing updates like ‘Now you can see who viewed your profile’ or a fake Dislike button. A large number of Facebookers fell for these scams, while the truth is that presently, Facebook does not support any of these functions and there aren't any third party apps that will comply, either.

This year we saw another set of malicious tricks that emerged with the intention to allure unsuspecting users. Let’s have a quick look at the scams that hit the social circuit like a viral and obviously, not one of the good variety, as we race through the end of 2011.

R.I.P Steve Jobs
October 5, 2011 marked the death of Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple and a charismatic pioneer who revolutionized technology. While many were grieving the demise of this creative genius, some malicious minds decided to cash in on this tragedy within hours. Scammers used freebies to attract users with posts like ‘In Memory of Steve Jobs, Apple has decided to give away 1000 Limited Edition iPad 2s’, ‘In the memory of Steve Jobs, a company is giving 50 iPads tonite’ . Different variations of these posts started emerging quickly, too. Who wouldnt want to own an iPad, especially when it's free. Unfortunately, the link took users directly to survey and gambling websites. Graham Culey, from Sophos managed to shut down this viral scam, which was a link through the bit.ly short url service. Though folks at bit.ly shut the link, the damage was already done as it had recorded about 15,000 victims of this hoax in just 15 hours.

Freebies to attract facebook members (Image Credit: Sophos)

OMG! What are you doing in this video
OMG! has been an expression that scammers have been using throughout this year. The OMG and WTF scams appeared in varying forms, inviting both excitement and shock. The curious ones who just couldn't stop themselves were not only directed to a survey form which they unwittingly filled, but also spammed their friends’ Wall wanting to share the "wealth". OMG! [name] what are you doing in this video? spread like wildfire. Once you clicked on the link, the malicious software posted the link onto others’ Walls, which made them believe that it's a genuine post from a legitimate sender. Clicking the link only spread the menace, further. Similar OMG scams were Spider under her skin, which would begin with age verification and of course a survey, albeit not before spamming your friends. You might be familiar with other OMG scams like - This is what happened to his Ex-Girlfriend and ex-girlfriend revenge.

Bin Laden Dead Video
One of the most talked about incidents of the year was the death of Osama Bin Laden. The Al-Qaeda leader was killed by U.S. forces in May, this year and the U.S. President declared that his death photos wouldn't be released. Scammers soon came up with supposedly banned footage of the killing, which started spreading on Facebook. The post read, “Disturbing, yet awesome...SHOCKING NEW video of OSAMA BIN LADEN'S DEATH, Exclusive BANNED VIDEO footage of Osama Bin Laden being killed.” Users were tricked into hitting the like and share button, and once the link was hit, it was eventually posted on Walls of others in their profile. And a big surprise, here was that trying to view the video would take you to yet another survey.

Curious users please dont click (Image Credit: Sophos)