WhatsApp scam: What to look out for

A number of human rights barristers have had fake accounts impersonating them set up on Twitter overnight this month. IOIT have had reports of this happening to several of our clients. The purpose of the scam is unclear but people who follow the accounts back then receive a message asking them to join a WhatsApp group. If accepted it may lead to the WhatsApp account being hacked, or, if the person’s security settings prevent that, they may be locked out of their account for a period. It seems from Twitter that at least one person is reporting having handed over card details.

As such, we would like to provide some general good security practice around WhatsApp. There are quite a large number of WhatsApp scams going around these days where people are tricked in to handing over their WhatsApp login and then get locked out of the account. The recovery process from WhatsApp then takes a week.

We strongly encourage all WhatsApp users to setup 2-Factor authentication to prevent the risk of their account being taken over (see guidance from WhatsApp below).

Apart from that, we remind everyone to always be wary of unsolicited contact from online accounts (Twitter, Instagram etc).

Please don’t hesitate to contact IOIT should you find you have been hacked or require any IT Security advice, and we will be pleased to help.

InstantOnIT
Email: [email protected]
Phone Number: 020 3855 0055