Beware of these new Facebook scams!
Have you been contacted by a Facebook "representative" recently?
Well, don’t shoot the messenger, but that may have been a scam email!
Whether it’s by email, text, or messenger, Facebook scams happen all too often. Fortunately, there are a few ways to immediately spot whether a message from Facebook is real or fake.
First, you need to know a few key details about Facebook. One of our personal favorites is anything that Facebook has emailed you about will be in the ad account so there is no reason to ever click the links!
Here are more helpful notes:
- Facebook will NEVER ask you for your password in an email or Facebook message!
- Facebook will not send you a temporary password as an email attachment.
- Facebook will not demand money from you in exchange for keeping your profile active.
- Anything that Facebook has emailed you about will be in the ad account so there is no reason to ever click the links!
Now that you know what the real Facebook won’t do, here are some things that scammers pretending to be Facebook will do:
- They will create alias email addresses that look incredibly similar to Facebook’s.
- They will email you an “important” message about your account, and ask you to log in to your account via a link sent in the email.
- They will claim you went against Facebook’s Community Standards and ask you to resolve the issue via a link or email attachment.
- They will say you won an outstanding prize and to claim it you just have to log in to your account.
Facebook Approved Emails
If the email doesn’t come from one of the following email addresses, then it is likely a phishing attempt and you should block it immediately!
- @business.fb.com
- @support.facebook.com
- @fb.com
- advertise-noreply@facebookmail.com
- update@em.facebookmail.com
- @mediapartnerships.fb.com
Here are some of our pro tips that have helped our clients ward off scammers:
- Never, I repeat, NEVER open an attachment emailed to you from a stranger! It is often a trojan virus and can sweep your computer like the Greeks did to the City of Troy!
- Verify whether a link is secure before clicking it. Hover over it and confirm the official URL. When in doubt, just don’t click on it.
- Set-up two-factor authentication on as many of your accounts as possible.
- Block profiles, emails, and callers if you have any suspicion of a phishing attempt. You can also report suspicious emails to phish@fb.com.
If you suspect you’ve been duped, change your Facebook password immediately and contact a real Facebook representative.
Don’t feel duped if you’ve fallen victim to a Facebook scammer - they’re good at what they do! However, if you keep these things in mind, you’ll be better prepared to fight off phishing attempts in the future.
When scams do happen, we suggest you take the following immediate steps. Even if a scammer gets access and is able to spend, reassured we can work with you to ensure you're refunded every penny spent from Facebook. They take this incredibly seriously and while you do have to be patient, we've always gotten clients full refunds and full access back when there is fraudulent spending.
1) Inform our team ASAP so we can try to remove the bad actor before they start spending.
2) Remove your billing method from Facebook.
3) Pause your CC
4) Have our team open a support ticket to alert Facebook, remove the bad actor and start the refund process.
P.S. Scams are at an all-time high right now and will continue to fester during the holiday season. Don’t let them win! 😊
