The popularity of WhatsApp is enormous, both in Brazil and in the world, and this fame has made it one of the main targets of cyber criminals, who use the application to spread malicious campaigns and acquire money or personal information from victims. With that in mind, check out in this article which are the most common scams on WhatsApp and prevent yourself from falling into traps.
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Understand more about WhatsApp scams
According to several companies working with virtual security, criminals are using well-crafted approaches to make victims on WhatsApp. According to information on this topic, it is possible to observe some patterns that scammers use to make users fall into their traps. Check the list of some cases below.
1. money request
Asking for money by impersonating a victim's family member is the most commonly used approach, probably because it results in faster returns to criminals. First, they gain access to the victim's profile information and contact list. Afterwards, they create a WhatsApp account with the user's profile picture and start communicating with victims via chat to get money.
In general, the excuse used by criminals is very similar: they claim that they need to transfer money to someone, but cannot do so due to daily transfer restriction, a problem with the bank, or some other type of blocking of account. Criminals often ask the victim to transfer the money to a third party and inform them that the money will be returned the next day.
2. Contact of companies
Another method used by criminals is to impersonate commercial establishments to deceive their victims – the example that has been most seen is the search for INSS benefits.
In this way, criminals create fake versions of large online stores, government agencies, direct sales companies of products and various others, and contact victims to obtain personal information, among other requests financial.
3. WhatsApp account hijacking
In this case, criminals tell a story to persuade the victim to provide a code that will be received by the application. In possession of this code, scammers can register the victim's WhatsApp account on another device and thus use the profile to apply blows.