Today I encountered a new type of scam, that is different and more personalized, so please make sure to check this out - and stay safe.
A Twitter/X (verified) user contacted me; guess what he first told me - and how he mentioned my PeakD profile..
This was their first message.
"Hi, I saw your blog on Peakd, you articulate your thoughts well and choose photos nicely for each post :)"
How would you react to this?
I got immediately a red flag.
Why?
This account had just followed me, and when I followed them back - this message was instantly sent to me. This means that it probably was an automated message service.
I was very worried right from the start, so I wanted to talk to him more and understand where the scam was hiding.
I asked him if he is in PeakD and tried to understand what he wanted from me.
The word "Interview" was another red flag, because I had read about a few scams with Interviews (link at the end of the post)
They even wanted to pay me!
I still was looking for that bigger red flag to verify that this was all a scam!
And I think I finally got it when he told me that I will need to download an install a launcher, offered only to limited people and that the interview should take place in early April.
Therefore, they are trying to create urgency and make me do it immediately, without thinking too much about it.
The part that worried me a lot was that this person did an investigation, read my profile, took the time to be kind so that I would believe and trust them.
Most of the messages (I believe) we all receive on Twitter/X are in the below form - too similar!
etc etc... So this one was too personalized and too easy to be trusted. I hope that this person only talked to me.
Of course it took no time for them to send me a referral (why referral?) link to the launcher, which is just a page where you need to click on 'start' (I did not do it)
What now?
I have contacted the company on Discord and informed them.
What to do if this happens to you, because, who knows? This may be true in some cases :)
- Do not click any links or download anything if you don't contact the company to ask them if this is legit or not. Be extra cautious, with anyone who takes the first step in contacting you out of the blue, please!
Check these links too:
https://twitter.com/impranavm_/status/1744661325467541505
- impranavm_
https://www.theverge.com/2024/1/19/24043482/the-verge-crypto-calendly-scam-phishing
Thank you for your attention, I will update this post if there is anything new to share and in the meantime please let me know below if you had any similar communication.