Ignore ‘check 121.im’ messages
Don't let a bug into your computer through Facebook.
I have lost count of how many Facebook scams have been conducted in the past couple of weeks. Facebook users, news readers and anyone who likes a good scam knows already that ponbon.im, 121.im, 151.im and other similar variations are dummy web sites looking to steal your Facebook login information.
This time the scam is personal
I had never gotten a Facebook scam message until today. Someone who I know from a former job, but who has never sent me a message on Facebook before, sent a message to my inbox today. All it said was “Check 121.im.”
It was obviously a fake, a fraud, a scam. I found myself with a strange curiosity and an urge to click on the link anyway, just to see what would happen. But I resisted.
If there’s one thing I do not want to mess with, it’s the possibility of identity theft. While these Facebook phishers won’t have direct access to my credit card numbers, letting someone know your login name or password is never a good idea. Next thing you know, some con artist is taking out installment loans in your name.
Fraud recap
For those of you who don’t use Facebook and thus are unfamiliar with this recurring scam, here’s a clip from my first article about this series of fraudulent Facebook facades:
Reports have been flooding in about phishing site fbstarter.com. The dummy web site poses as a Facebook login page to get users to type in their usernames and passwords.
We all know that online scams set to steal personal information such as passwords are the first step on the road to identity theft.
Phishers keep changing lure
You may recall just a couple of days ago when fbaction.net pulled exactly the same password-stealing scheme. Therein lies the problem. Facebook blocked fbaction.net and it has blocked fbstarter.com, but these scams were likely conducted by the same people.
That means these phishers are changing their scheme slightly and launching new attacks after one is thwarted.
New attacks indeed
Since then, the phishers have gone from using .com and .net addresses to using .im addresses, and I am sure they will once again change their tactics. It seems there are new fake addresses showing up in Facebook users’ inboxes two or three times per week.
I don’t know what kind of schemes they’ll come up with next, but there’s one thing I do know: I am glad I did not click on that link in my Facebook inbox.
According to the International Business Times:
If you receive an email like check ponbon.im, check 121.im or check 151.im, just delete the email and DO NOT click the link, because it may compromise your account too, give you viruses and may even delete some of your friends.
Whew, I’m glad I didn’t let my curiosity get the best of me.
Yes please be careful peeps keep an eye out for weird stuff when using Facebook
Another scam? They just keep coming, huh! How far will people go to advertise their petty works?
Be careful on facebook – new spam/scam message going around – Don’t open subject lines with Hello or message: “Check ponbon.im”
I wonder what security measures Facebook actually has in place to prevent this kind of thing. It’s the most popular social networking site in the world. I imagine they have lawyers that can sue phishers for copyright infringement, if nothing else. Myspace has problems with this stuff as well – you click on one ad, even accidentally, for free ring tones and the next thing you know you have a bunch of posts you didn’t write advertising for websites you’ve never heard of.