The next movie installment in the popular “Twilight” series is tomorrow and already the scammers are taking advantage of the buzz surrounding the movie. Messages are appearing on Facebook pages saying “To celebrate we’re giving away FREE Twilight Vampire contacts.” Thousands upon thousands of people have already fallen for this scam in its first couple of days. In fact, you won’t get tinted contact lenses if you click on the link. If you do click on the link you are required to click on “like” and share the scam Facebook post thereby unknowingly snaring your friends into the scam. The next step is to click on a “consumer reward” link that in turn lead you to phony information forms that you must complete to get the free contact lenses that never come. You keep being sent to fill out one form after another with the promise of free tickets to go with the free lenses. Unfortunately, not only do you not get any free Twilight stuff, but you end up providing personal information that can lead to your becoming a victim of identity theft.
TIPS
Never trust posts on your Facebook page even if they come from your friends because you can never be sure that they are really coming from your friends and not from a scammer who has hacked your friend’s Facebook account. Never provide personal information online unless you know both that the entity requesting it is legitimate, needs that information and that the website is secure. One thing that is important in determining the security of the website can be ascertained by looking at the website address and making sure that it starts with “https” rather than “http.” The extra “s” means that its data is encrypted. A little common sense goes a long way. Anything that is attractive and free should be suspect and if that same offer also requires personal information about you, the chances are it is a scam.