Facebook scams are getting sneakier and sneakier – with the latest attack using the lure of a free T-shirt celebrating Facebook’s birthday in an attempt to steal the secret backdoor key to your account.
The offer seems attractive enough – a webpage claiming to celebrate Facebook’s 7th birthday, saying that it has over 1.9 million official T-shirts in stock.
The webpage tells you to visit Facebook Mobile, and find on that page the personalised email address that you can use to post status updates or upload photos and videos straight to your profile.
Here’s what the email id can do -
- The email subject will be used as the caption of your photo or video if your email contains photo or video.
- The email subject will be used as your updated status if your email contains no photo or video.
Many people are probably unaware that such a thing exists – but every Facebook user has a secret mobile email address they can use for this purpose.
The important thing, of course, is to keep it secret. Because if someone else finds it out, they’ll be able to post status messages to your Facebook page or upload videos and photos to your wall – which your friends will be able to see.
The scammers, unsurprisingly, want your secret mobile email address for Facebook. And so they claim that you have to hand it over to verify you are a legitimate Facebook user in order to get your T-shirt.
If you were hit by this scam then you must refresh your Facebook mobile upload email address – that way the bad guys you just gave it too won’t be able to use it as a secret backdoor into your account.
How to refresh your Facebook Mobile upload email address
1. Visit www.facebook.com/mobile.
2. Click on “find Out More” under “Upload Via Mobile” Section.
3. Click on “Refresh your upload Email” from window that appears on performing step2.
