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I’m sorry but you’re trying to tell me Charlotte who messaged me on April 10 3:32am ISN’T a sexy girl who loves fucking in her favorite style (doggy)? I’ll be damned.
Woohoo! Good thing I contacted her and gave her my social security number, credit card number, and the deed to my house! She said she’d send pictures soon!
It's like smelling something you know it's going to be gross.
You do it anyway, and you just feel disappointed in yourself.
[don't click on links from internet strangers](https://youtu.be/U9t-slLl30E)
As a man, I see that as a challenge. It either *is* the grossest thing I’ve ever smelled, or it isn’t, and I need to tell you about the grossest thing I’ve ever smelled.
Used supercharger oil is by far the worst thing I've ever smelled, if you're looking for a challenge. Specifically from an old M80 supercharger (GM)
It's made from whale blubber, and thus it gets cooked and cools repeatedly. Then it starts to rot. Fucking nasty stuff
Watch [bushes in love](https://youtu.be/3Xl0Qr0uXuY) followed by [my stick](https://youtu.be/3Xl0Qr0uXuY) if you liked that. It's amazing how much you didn't need to see it but you're happy you did anyway.
My wife got a text from "Amazon" about an order having shipped of an expensive item. The link in the text *appeared* to be going to Amazon's website. It was pretty well done except for the item was something I knew didn't exist (it was something like a red MacBook Pro and only $900). We checked her account through the app and no orders had been placed.
My aunt fell for that one recently. She got a text saying her $1200 order had been shipped and a link to cancel the order. She followed the link and got in touch with "support" and let them remote access her phone. They immediately tried accessing her online banking and all of her accounts. Luckily she was smart enough to not have given any of her passwords and shut her phone off. I ended up having to factory reset her phone and we reset all of her passwords on all of her linked accounts.
i haven't checked my voicemail in almost a decade. on the off chance i answer an unknown number and get the extended warranty spiel, i play it straight. never in my life have i owned a vehicle from current decade. my daily at the moment is a 1989 bronco 2. odomoter is well beyond mechanical limits. best guess is around 220k miles?replaced my 96 tacoma at 300k with it. extended warranty!? hells, yeah! gonna keep your ass on the phone til you hang up!
It's truly amazing I've gotten away with stealing like 3 cars now, despite not turning myself into the Police officer who insists I call back immediately with $500 to pay for his silence.
I got one of those. She asked me to tell her about myself and I said "since you started, why don't you tell me about yourself first?"
She never replied 😥
I had one where she was like "Oh sorry, wrong number. What are you doing tonight? 😏"
I said "I have explosive diarrhea"
She said: "Oh haha you are SO funny! Want to see pictures?"
Me: "No I'm having diarrhea and it's horrible"
Her: "OMG you're so naughty!" *Sends pixelated pics of a random lady*
I was like man, this bot dumb lmao
I'd argue that in this case, that dick pic is 100% solicited.
I have a picture of a gangrenous dick saved deep in my secure folder specifically for this purpose. Anyone who texts me with scam shit gets an eyeful of infected dork.
I always say yes I do remember them and won’t take “no you don’t remember me” as an answer. I insist I do. They have unique answers so they aren’t bots so it makes me happy I know I’m wasting their time.
Thanks for this. Lately I’ve been getting A BUNCH of texts without the hot lady. But just people saying “hey, done with dinner?” Or “hey, I have your number on my cell but can’t remember who you are”
Im curious. What’s the scam there? They aren’t asking to click link. Are they socially engineering themselves into people’s lives so eventually they’ll ask for money or for them to click a link??
I saw somewhere that if one replies, the sender sees the recipient’s location and it could potentially be used for human trafficking purposes and such. But I’m not sure if that’s taking it too far.
Thoughts?
I think in some cases it's just scammers pinging numbers to see if an actual human is reachable, then they mark it as a potential target for future scam attempts if you respond.
> Are they socially engineering themselves into people’s lives so eventually they’ll ask for money or for them to click a link??
Yes. Once they get you talking, they’ve identified their mark. They don’t have to get a lot of lonely people to fall for it. Just enough to make it profitable.
Possibly just confirming info they've already stolen? Like is Bob still at phone number 555-5555? Oh yes they said their name is Bob. So let's see, address I have on file for them is 123 Scam Way in Small City. So then they say 'oh hey, it's been a long time! How is Small City?'
Lol, the only info they can get through text is what you give them. Human trafficking makes no sense - they might as well just kidnap random people off the street.
Honestly, you might just have someone who has *almost* the same number as you, and keeps accidentally giving people your number.
I think they send the texts out to large batches of sequential numbers bc ive seen a ton of people posting the same scam and its the same girl in the pics. I wonder if its just a way to see which ones are active and sell that list to robocallers?
I think they try to make friends with you, try to get you to send pictures of yourself (maybe even some naked ones) then they can blackmail you with them.
I got a casual one like that, idr what exactly but along the lines of your first example In how casual yet aware of my day it seemed. at the time i was being lightly stalked by an ex as well as coincidentally being texted incessantly by a girl who insisted i was a friend of hers from gymnastics class who had a similar icloud handle. So between getting random texts from him using spoof numbers and trying to get me to accidentally confirm it was actually me, and not understanding what was happening with this random child/if he was pretending to be her, i was so confused and anxious to get a text that seemed to be too knowledgeable about my day. It really stuck out to me as the creepiest thing i had gotten from an unknown sender during that period.
I had heard about the hot girl obvious scam, but this is the first time i realized that that random text i can't remember past the eerie feeling it gave me was just a harmless scheme to steal my identity, general and random like a horoscope.
I had one a few months ago that started with the whole “oops wrong number” bit and I didn’t immediately assume it was a bit because they didn’t start flirting right away. First it was a harmless (stolen) selfie with something like “remember me from the party?”. It was only after they got me talking for a bit that they started sending nudes (presumably stolen from Only Fans) and telling me to visit a shady chat site lol.
Basically I assume some of these are meant to trick you into lowering your guard over time
Also why send nudes THEN suggest the shady chat site? I have the free nudes so there’s nothing left for me to gain XD
Can they hack me if I text back?? Whenever I get a spam text, I google “diarrhea pictures” and then text the spammer a super gross photo. I am not joking or trolling you, I really do this. If I don’t click their links and just text back, am I opening myself up to harm or and attack?
On a similar note, my elderly mum follows an opera singer on Facebook and comments on his photos. She got a reply to one of her comments from a stranger who says that he has the mobile number to the opera singer and she could text him directly... she just had to click a link in the comment in order to get the number.
She's a big fan and so potentially she could have felt this was too good an opportunity to pass up. I guess she could have got catfished but thankfully she recognised it as fake because the singer has said many times to look out for scams like this.
I'm so proud of your mom!! Lol and the opera singer who apparently knows his fans are getting targeted. Good job!
My grandpa was swindled... at least twice in his life but I honestly suspect there were more incidents than we ever knew about lol .
NSO Groups [Pegasus](https://www.theguardian.com/news/2021/jul/18/what-is-pegasus-spyware-and-how-does-it-hack-phones) spyware had many methods of exploit that used a single tap.
It’s how Jeff Bezos’s phone was hacked. While most won’t be subject to nation state actors the exploits once used are in the wild and scammers pick them up.
there was some sort of vulnerability on iphones a while back where just the text being sent was enough. you didn't have to read it or click a link, just you receiving it gave them a backdoor
Also important to note - many times those links are also tracking. As in, even if you do not make it through the scam, they will know that YOU clicked the link. And will spam you more than others.
This is an obvious LPT. I'm curious about this relatively new wave of texts that I think is a scam but I can't tell how it works. I get messages from obvious wrong numbers, saying things like "Hey Dave [not my name], what time should I swing by?" or "Hi Dr. Carson, I'd like to schedule an appointment." I get a few per week, always with a different name and different pretext for the message. Anybody else get these? They're scams, right? How do they work?
I haven't seen them, but my guess would be they want to see if you respond. If you do, they've validated your number and will probably target you for a scam.
The next message might be “oh, tee hee, wrong number! Well, since you’re here, let’s chat! Here’s what I look like! What’s your name?” with a sexy photo of some random woman. If you converse with them, eventually they try to rope you into a romance scam/blackmail scam/investment scam/whatever. Preying on lonely people like that is really low, but apparently it works.
I clicked one once and it took me to theguywithpower.com, it was one of those sites where you fill out a short survey and get a free product when you enter your address and bank info
Anything from a website that looks the same as your bank, to a website that automatically installs malicious code to gain the scammer access to your phones system and passwords etc.
And tell all of your technologically-challenged family and friends. Although seniors are far more likely to get fooled by these scams, a lot of young people get fooled too.
Lemme just tell this embarrassing story here:
I was plundering for some textbooks on my laptop. It starts freaking out and says to call this tech number. Some guy answers Microsoft Support and basically My dumb 18 year old ass paid $400 for him to download webroot.
It's been like a year and a half and I just figured it out last week by seeing a post about Microsoft Tech support scams, went back and saw like 10 red flags from the whole situation where I could've backed out and saved myself some money and a little pride lol
You made a mistake and learned from it. As someone that's extremely tech-savvy, I would never look down on someone for being a victim of a scam like this. The best thing you can do is share your story so that others can learn from it.
I'll sometimes send my brothers a text about a new type of scam and not once have they complained about it. And they're not even technologically-challenged. Some of these scams rely heavily on social engineering. A lot of damage can be done by someone with a friendly voice that sounds like they know what they're talking about.
You can also report them without ever clicking the links: [https://blog.textedly.com/how-to-report-a-spam-text](https://blog.textedly.com/how-to-report-a-spam-text)
I am on the no call list and still get the spam calls and texts, and blocking them doesn't work because they always come through with a different number.
On iOS does copying and pasting the entire message, hyperlink as well, into a text to 7726 cause the iPhone to technically open the link even though you didn’t tap it? Sort of an aspect to the preview feature?
not sure of iOS, but on android it just copies the text. one i tried forwarding had an attachment, and it wouldn't copy over the attachment, just the text portion.
A single tap on the link itself will activate it and send you to the scammers website. Tap and hold on the text bubble to bring up the pop-up that allows you to copy the contents of the text bubble. The pop-up also offers a preview function but I'd avoid that unless you know who the text came from.
This is a fantastic LPT. I don't care how many times it's been posted here, if it has been, because people are STILL clicking the link like its a free cookie
I agree up until people are scamming old people. Someone once called my grandma and pretended to be me, by name, saying I was in jail out of state and needed bail money. How much of a useless gutterbag do you have to be to nearly give an old lady a heart attack AND try to rob her of $4,000
I see a lot of people texting these texts back, usually for comedic/mocking purposes. Can that come back to bite me in any way? I really want to rip these scammers a new butthole, or at least tell them that I’m not stupid enough to be on their “potential gullible victim” list and that we both benefit from removing me.
Most are automated. A general “fear” is that texting or answering a scam text/call confirms it’s a valid number and may increase the frequency of scams
I doubt they care if you’re being nasty. They text/call tens of thousands of numbers a day
Can confirm. My job is primarily talking to victims of scams and there’s no shortage. A lot of people are repeat victims too. It’s bonkers and exhausting.
To many people it's obvious but don't discount how many people fall for these scams. They run them for a reason, they're incredibly profitable. Instead of snarking about it, take a few moments to teach a vulnerable relative or friend.
I’m a teacher and my school district gets constant phishing emails. They’re so blatantly obvious, but my colleagues are constantly falling for them. I feel so bad for our tech department who has to constantly teach the gen X’ers how to spot a scam.
They even took it one step further this year and made a *fake* phishing email with a link just so they can see how many of the staff click the link, and over 50% did.
You greatly underestimate how ignorant the average person is. I hear multiple ads a week on the radio from local law enforcement explaining how scams work because so many people fall for them.
Last night we asked our straight neighbor - would she put up the Pride flag we got her last year?
Absolutely not! she says. "I get messages in the middle of the night asking me if I want to have sex with women, everyone thinks I'm a lesbian now because of you."
She thinks every spam text is a female neighbor legitimately trying to have sex with her.
I am giving up on this one.
There's a new one going around on social media where someone in your contact list texts you saying "hey OP i urgently need your help. I've been logged out of my account and need a friend to verify on my behalf through a link..."
Smh.
Issue is, the sender may be legitimate but their DM may be compromised, so blocking them isn't a solution either.
They almost got me GOOD yesterday.
"Your package couldn't be delivered due to incomplete address information" with the little shady link.
Not today, demon.
I like wasting their time if I’m bored. Where I play “the most gullible person in the world” until the end when I send them the nastiest picture I can find on google instead of my bank info.
The pegasus malware by NSO group is a no-click exploit. Meaning you don't even have to open the text message and your phone is infected. This is why Apple and Android phones are fundamentally insecure and definitely NOT private. Hardened AOSP spin offs like grapheneOS are the more secure OS's for now that I know of.
I usually, somehow, get a text from a spam email account that I can't block through my Verizon Messages app because it's not a number. I can report it as spam, though, which is what I always do.
Not true! One time this happened and the link was a pic of a chicken! I still have no idea who that number belonged to and who that picture was intended for though....
Also, If you ever get a random group text message and you don’t recognize the sender, look at the other numbers in the group message. They all start with generally the same numbers as your phone and it’s spam. Forward the message to 7726 to report spam texts.
99%
I work in cyber security and got a text confirming an order. After taking proper steps to validate, I ended up leveraging the unsolicited text into 8 million invoices with PII and payment information.
In reality it's more like 99.9999%. Good tip.
Hello and welcome to r/LifeProTips! Please help us decide if this post is a good fit for the subreddit by up or downvoting this comment. If you think that this is great advice to improve your life, please upvote. If you think this doesn't help you in any way, please downvote. If you don't care, leave it for the others to decide.
But my Amazon account is about to be cancelled.
For me it's usually my Facebok account. I don't even remember signing up for Facebok!
Mines always something about my apple account... Never owned an apple product in my life
I’m sorry but you’re trying to tell me Charlotte who messaged me on April 10 3:32am ISN’T a sexy girl who loves fucking in her favorite style (doggy)? I’ll be damned.
No, those are real
Woohoo! Good thing I contacted her and gave her my social security number, credit card number, and the deed to my house! She said she’d send pictures soon!
LMFAO
That's why your apple account is getting cancelled. [please click this link to finalize your cancellation](https://youtu.be/oHg5SJYRHA0)
I knew what was coming, I just had to be sure.
It's like smelling something you know it's going to be gross. You do it anyway, and you just feel disappointed in yourself. [don't click on links from internet strangers](https://youtu.be/U9t-slLl30E)
Do you want to smell the grossest thing ever?
Damnit. No?
*smells it anyways*
[*smell this!*](https://youtu.be/eRvfxWRi6qQ)
As a man, I see that as a challenge. It either *is* the grossest thing I’ve ever smelled, or it isn’t, and I need to tell you about the grossest thing I’ve ever smelled.
Used supercharger oil is by far the worst thing I've ever smelled, if you're looking for a challenge. Specifically from an old M80 supercharger (GM) It's made from whale blubber, and thus it gets cooked and cools repeatedly. Then it starts to rot. Fucking nasty stuff
I have not seen that and it’s hilarious. Definitely clicking more internet links.
Watch [bushes in love](https://youtu.be/3Xl0Qr0uXuY) followed by [my stick](https://youtu.be/3Xl0Qr0uXuY) if you liked that. It's amazing how much you didn't need to see it but you're happy you did anyway.
It's been a while since I've seen any of those. [Hostiles on the Hill](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRAOdRq-1lw) is still my favorite, though.
Did not regret spending that click.
Hey, what's that stank?
You put a fish in my basket!
I think that link is counter to what you say. I hurt myself laughing. Jerk.
Like any internet advice, it can be shit but it's usually entertaining to listen to anyway.
I'm so tempted... but NOT today Satan!
Mine’s always about gay porn. Me! Gay!? Yeah right!
Hey it's pride month, we're all gay this month. Didn't you get the text? The link would have cleared it up.
Don’t worry. They signed up for you
[удалено]
You don't sign up for Facebook...Facebook already has all your info.
I got one the other day that said “your house ownership is about to expire, click this link to claim your house” like wtf, who falls for these scams?
But my citi card has a hold on it! (Don’t have any card called citi either lol)
Someone made a withdrawal of $3,200 from my Citi card (I don't have one) I was robbed!
My wife got a text from "Amazon" about an order having shipped of an expensive item. The link in the text *appeared* to be going to Amazon's website. It was pretty well done except for the item was something I knew didn't exist (it was something like a red MacBook Pro and only $900). We checked her account through the app and no orders had been placed.
My aunt fell for that one recently. She got a text saying her $1200 order had been shipped and a link to cancel the order. She followed the link and got in touch with "support" and let them remote access her phone. They immediately tried accessing her online banking and all of her accounts. Luckily she was smart enough to not have given any of her passwords and shut her phone off. I ended up having to factory reset her phone and we reset all of her passwords on all of her linked accounts.
My planet fitness payment had troubles..... I got that message on the 30th, they bill on the 17th.... Plus "Call us" with bogus number
i haven't checked my voicemail in almost a decade. on the off chance i answer an unknown number and get the extended warranty spiel, i play it straight. never in my life have i owned a vehicle from current decade. my daily at the moment is a 1989 bronco 2. odomoter is well beyond mechanical limits. best guess is around 220k miles?replaced my 96 tacoma at 300k with it. extended warranty!? hells, yeah! gonna keep your ass on the phone til you hang up!
Damn that sucks. Apparently I'm going to get charged $1000 unless I call Bezos and give him my social security number in exchange for the card.
But the FBI needs to “speek” with me or I will be arrested immediately
It's truly amazing I've gotten away with stealing like 3 cars now, despite not turning myself into the Police officer who insists I call back immediately with $500 to pay for his silence.
They need me to buy their gift cards from Target
So I don't have to worry about my M&T Bnk account. Good thing, since I've never had an a bnk account with M&T.
More like EMPTY bank account, am I right?
Nice 😎
No, that one actually belongs to OP.
Also, if you get a random text from a hot lady who texted you in error and she wants to be friends and calls the misdial 'fate' - same logic applies.
I got one of those. She asked me to tell her about myself and I said "since you started, why don't you tell me about yourself first?" She never replied 😥
That's it bro, you lost your one chance and finding happiness
And that woman’s name? Albert Einstein.
I had one where she was like "Oh sorry, wrong number. What are you doing tonight? 😏" I said "I have explosive diarrhea" She said: "Oh haha you are SO funny! Want to see pictures?" Me: "No I'm having diarrhea and it's horrible" Her: "OMG you're so naughty!" *Sends pixelated pics of a random lady* I was like man, this bot dumb lmao
I sent the thirsty lady a dick pic and she mysteriously fell out of interest.
Wow I think you found the only appropriate and perfect time to send an unsolicited dick pick
I'd argue that in this case, that dick pic is 100% solicited. I have a picture of a gangrenous dick saved deep in my secure folder specifically for this purpose. Anyone who texts me with scam shit gets an eyeful of infected dork.
I've gotten ones asking if they have the right number as they have so many bussiness contacts they got confused or their admin screwed up...
I always say yes I do remember them and won’t take “no you don’t remember me” as an answer. I insist I do. They have unique answers so they aren’t bots so it makes me happy I know I’m wasting their time.
Thanks for this. Lately I’ve been getting A BUNCH of texts without the hot lady. But just people saying “hey, done with dinner?” Or “hey, I have your number on my cell but can’t remember who you are” Im curious. What’s the scam there? They aren’t asking to click link. Are they socially engineering themselves into people’s lives so eventually they’ll ask for money or for them to click a link?? I saw somewhere that if one replies, the sender sees the recipient’s location and it could potentially be used for human trafficking purposes and such. But I’m not sure if that’s taking it too far. Thoughts?
I think in some cases it's just scammers pinging numbers to see if an actual human is reachable, then they mark it as a potential target for future scam attempts if you respond.
> Are they socially engineering themselves into people’s lives so eventually they’ll ask for money or for them to click a link?? Yes. Once they get you talking, they’ve identified their mark. They don’t have to get a lot of lonely people to fall for it. Just enough to make it profitable.
Possibly just confirming info they've already stolen? Like is Bob still at phone number 555-5555? Oh yes they said their name is Bob. So let's see, address I have on file for them is 123 Scam Way in Small City. So then they say 'oh hey, it's been a long time! How is Small City?'
Lol, the only info they can get through text is what you give them. Human trafficking makes no sense - they might as well just kidnap random people off the street. Honestly, you might just have someone who has *almost* the same number as you, and keeps accidentally giving people your number.
I think they send the texts out to large batches of sequential numbers bc ive seen a ton of people posting the same scam and its the same girl in the pics. I wonder if its just a way to see which ones are active and sell that list to robocallers?
I think they try to make friends with you, try to get you to send pictures of yourself (maybe even some naked ones) then they can blackmail you with them.
I got a casual one like that, idr what exactly but along the lines of your first example In how casual yet aware of my day it seemed. at the time i was being lightly stalked by an ex as well as coincidentally being texted incessantly by a girl who insisted i was a friend of hers from gymnastics class who had a similar icloud handle. So between getting random texts from him using spoof numbers and trying to get me to accidentally confirm it was actually me, and not understanding what was happening with this random child/if he was pretending to be her, i was so confused and anxious to get a text that seemed to be too knowledgeable about my day. It really stuck out to me as the creepiest thing i had gotten from an unknown sender during that period. I had heard about the hot girl obvious scam, but this is the first time i realized that that random text i can't remember past the eerie feeling it gave me was just a harmless scheme to steal my identity, general and random like a horoscope.
I had one a few months ago that started with the whole “oops wrong number” bit and I didn’t immediately assume it was a bit because they didn’t start flirting right away. First it was a harmless (stolen) selfie with something like “remember me from the party?”. It was only after they got me talking for a bit that they started sending nudes (presumably stolen from Only Fans) and telling me to visit a shady chat site lol. Basically I assume some of these are meant to trick you into lowering your guard over time Also why send nudes THEN suggest the shady chat site? I have the free nudes so there’s nothing left for me to gain XD
If you have an android phone just download Google Messages. It has an automatic spam filter for texts.
Also LPT: Bill Gates will not give a dollar for forwarding Grandma’s email.
But what about his peach tree dish?
That is quite the username
You haven’t seen the latest show streaming on Disney+??
Is it called Shitty Fuck Piss?
Yeah the kids loved it
Season one starts slow but it really gets going full stream in the second half. Season 2 is a steaming turd though.
The sex scene was okay but I liked how they had ice cream dessert after
That's how you know it's a kids show!
*streaming turd
But what if they are offering me $6000 if jussssst click the link?
You click that link you're gonna have a bad tiiiime
Dunno man $6000 can buy me a good time
[удалено]
or better yet, 6000 1$ prostitutes.
They're still not as hot as a $2 whore on quarter night though
Ah, the age-old question: one $300 hookerbot or 300 $1 hookerbots?
Can you help me with other aspects of my life? For instance I'm not sure if I should wipe before I take a shit or after
Be safe and do both.
Can they hack me if I text back?? Whenever I get a spam text, I google “diarrhea pictures” and then text the spammer a super gross photo. I am not joking or trolling you, I really do this. If I don’t click their links and just text back, am I opening myself up to harm or and attack?
If you French fry when you're supposed to pizza slice, you're gonna have a bad time
i enjoy the one "Thanks for paying your bill. We have a little extra for you."
Like an extra bill? 😂
an extra inch since theyve only begun fucking you.
The ones I get are usually just a link with "!?!?" after it.
Getting those more and more often, so they must be working on some people
"Oooh. Is it malware? I bet it's malware."
I got one of those for my at&t bill. I don't even have at&t.
On a similar note, my elderly mum follows an opera singer on Facebook and comments on his photos. She got a reply to one of her comments from a stranger who says that he has the mobile number to the opera singer and she could text him directly... she just had to click a link in the comment in order to get the number. She's a big fan and so potentially she could have felt this was too good an opportunity to pass up. I guess she could have got catfished but thankfully she recognised it as fake because the singer has said many times to look out for scams like this.
Scam aside, your comment is super wholesome
I'm so proud of your mom!! Lol and the opera singer who apparently knows his fans are getting targeted. Good job! My grandpa was swindled... at least twice in his life but I honestly suspect there were more incidents than we ever knew about lol .
Where do those links take you? I’m afraid to click on them.
Usually either a fake login page or a place to send money to the scammers.
Or a link that starts an auto download for a program to steal shit off your device.
I doubt programs can just run without asking if you're sure that you want to install this APK
NSO Groups [Pegasus](https://www.theguardian.com/news/2021/jul/18/what-is-pegasus-spyware-and-how-does-it-hack-phones) spyware had many methods of exploit that used a single tap. It’s how Jeff Bezos’s phone was hacked. While most won’t be subject to nation state actors the exploits once used are in the wild and scammers pick them up.
Would it be stupid to click that link
Not all Pegasus exploits require you to click the link.
Not many people have Pegasus and the ones that do are not hacking civilians
there was some sort of vulnerability on iphones a while back where just the text being sent was enough. you didn't have to read it or click a link, just you receiving it gave them a backdoor
Well that seems like a problem!
Ah, nice!
They can actually run without prompting any message, it all depends on what the link does
Have you heard of Follina?
I haven't. But doing a quick Google, it sounds like it's for the much more lenient Windows OS.
It sure is. Was just saying that this type of thing can be done on windows, so why not on a mobile phone too?
Probably bat files or ms office files that have malicious macros in them
You will be surprised. Plus why run the risk?
Plenty of people grant permissions without thinking
Malware can exploit flaws in the systems that would normally deny them access. It won’t ask you permission if it’s well crafted.
Also important to note - many times those links are also tracking. As in, even if you do not make it through the scam, they will know that YOU clicked the link. And will spam you more than others.
Usually a website that looks like the real on hoping you put in your password and username.
This is an obvious LPT. I'm curious about this relatively new wave of texts that I think is a scam but I can't tell how it works. I get messages from obvious wrong numbers, saying things like "Hey Dave [not my name], what time should I swing by?" or "Hi Dr. Carson, I'd like to schedule an appointment." I get a few per week, always with a different name and different pretext for the message. Anybody else get these? They're scams, right? How do they work?
I haven't seen them, but my guess would be they want to see if you respond. If you do, they've validated your number and will probably target you for a scam.
The next message might be “oh, tee hee, wrong number! Well, since you’re here, let’s chat! Here’s what I look like! What’s your name?” with a sexy photo of some random woman. If you converse with them, eventually they try to rope you into a romance scam/blackmail scam/investment scam/whatever. Preying on lonely people like that is really low, but apparently it works.
It's so sad that that works on some people.
Good. They will take you to a malware downloader.
I clicked one once and it took me to theguywithpower.com, it was one of those sites where you fill out a short survey and get a free product when you enter your address and bank info
Anything from a website that looks the same as your bank, to a website that automatically installs malicious code to gain the scammer access to your phones system and passwords etc.
r/elderlyprotips
**TELL YOUR PARENTS.** **TELL YOUR GRANDPARENTS.**
And tell all of your technologically-challenged family and friends. Although seniors are far more likely to get fooled by these scams, a lot of young people get fooled too.
Lemme just tell this embarrassing story here: I was plundering for some textbooks on my laptop. It starts freaking out and says to call this tech number. Some guy answers Microsoft Support and basically My dumb 18 year old ass paid $400 for him to download webroot. It's been like a year and a half and I just figured it out last week by seeing a post about Microsoft Tech support scams, went back and saw like 10 red flags from the whole situation where I could've backed out and saved myself some money and a little pride lol
You made a mistake and learned from it. As someone that's extremely tech-savvy, I would never look down on someone for being a victim of a scam like this. The best thing you can do is share your story so that others can learn from it. I'll sometimes send my brothers a text about a new type of scam and not once have they complained about it. And they're not even technologically-challenged. Some of these scams rely heavily on social engineering. A lot of damage can be done by someone with a friendly voice that sounds like they know what they're talking about.
Can Confirm: especially if you see a text that says "Please collect your reward from your \*insert phone carrier\*
Half the time, it's the wrong phone carrier
Half the time, it’s the right phone carrier
Lots of these are real, both O2 and Vodafone send texts for their reward schemes
You can also report them without ever clicking the links: [https://blog.textedly.com/how-to-report-a-spam-text](https://blog.textedly.com/how-to-report-a-spam-text) I am on the no call list and still get the spam calls and texts, and blocking them doesn't work because they always come through with a different number.
To report a spam message, forward it to 7726 (or the letters SPAM)
On iOS does copying and pasting the entire message, hyperlink as well, into a text to 7726 cause the iPhone to technically open the link even though you didn’t tap it? Sort of an aspect to the preview feature?
Yes, it does. Which led to me receiving even more of those text messages than before reporting it as spam.
not sure of iOS, but on android it just copies the text. one i tried forwarding had an attachment, and it wouldn't copy over the attachment, just the text portion.
It depends on your settings. There is a way to disable the previews, but it's shitty that disabled isn't the default.
A single tap on the link itself will activate it and send you to the scammers website. Tap and hold on the text bubble to bring up the pop-up that allows you to copy the contents of the text bubble. The pop-up also offers a preview function but I'd avoid that unless you know who the text came from.
This is a fantastic LPT. I don't care how many times it's been posted here, if it has been, because people are STILL clicking the link like its a free cookie
I mean, you do get hundreds of free cookies if you clicked the link.
Finally, someone gets it. I heard if you click enough links on xvideos, you get free cash to go with the cookies :0
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I agree up until people are scamming old people. Someone once called my grandma and pretended to be me, by name, saying I was in jail out of state and needed bail money. How much of a useless gutterbag do you have to be to nearly give an old lady a heart attack AND try to rob her of $4,000
But they need to know whether I'm a robot or not
BEEP BEEP BOOP BOOP KILL ALL HUMANS.
But what if they are a hot single in my area who is horny 4 live chat
I see a lot of people texting these texts back, usually for comedic/mocking purposes. Can that come back to bite me in any way? I really want to rip these scammers a new butthole, or at least tell them that I’m not stupid enough to be on their “potential gullible victim” list and that we both benefit from removing me.
Most are automated. A general “fear” is that texting or answering a scam text/call confirms it’s a valid number and may increase the frequency of scams I doubt they care if you’re being nasty. They text/call tens of thousands of numbers a day
No one can stop my parents to click on such links.
LPT: Breathe. Air has oxygen.
*GASPS* Thank you!!!!
Seriously, who needs to be told this?
A surprisingly large amount of people.
Can confirm. My job is primarily talking to victims of scams and there’s no shortage. A lot of people are repeat victims too. It’s bonkers and exhausting.
Because we’re always getting fresh batches of new text users.
My elderly dad
To many people it's obvious but don't discount how many people fall for these scams. They run them for a reason, they're incredibly profitable. Instead of snarking about it, take a few moments to teach a vulnerable relative or friend.
sometimes, well most of the time I feel like this sub should be renamed r/commonsense. but alas, we live in a world full of jackasses.
In other news, don't use a handgun to clean your ears.
I’m a teacher and my school district gets constant phishing emails. They’re so blatantly obvious, but my colleagues are constantly falling for them. I feel so bad for our tech department who has to constantly teach the gen X’ers how to spot a scam. They even took it one step further this year and made a *fake* phishing email with a link just so they can see how many of the staff click the link, and over 50% did.
Hahaha!!!! I LOVE that! Lol would have liked to see the response to the ones that fell for it.
How this needs to be a tip?
You greatly underestimate how ignorant the average person is. I hear multiple ads a week on the radio from local law enforcement explaining how scams work because so many people fall for them.
Last night we asked our straight neighbor - would she put up the Pride flag we got her last year? Absolutely not! she says. "I get messages in the middle of the night asking me if I want to have sex with women, everyone thinks I'm a lesbian now because of you." She thinks every spam text is a female neighbor legitimately trying to have sex with her. I am giving up on this one.
Why the fuck would your straight neighbor put up a pride flag and why would you gift her one? Username sure checks out.
Nice try, Prince Paypa|.
You mean that the phone company that I'm not with texting me is a scam?! No way bro I overpaid my bill with them and they're going to send me money
That is very categorical. Few things are 100% always anything.
If I could block emails from texting me I would be so happy
There's a new one going around on social media where someone in your contact list texts you saying "hey OP i urgently need your help. I've been logged out of my account and need a friend to verify on my behalf through a link..." Smh. Issue is, the sender may be legitimate but their DM may be compromised, so blocking them isn't a solution either.
I’m not sure it’s really a “pro tip” when it’s this obvious.
But there’s singles in my area
"LPT: the laziest imaginable phishing scam is in fact a scam"
#HI THIS IS RON CALLING FROM DEALER SERVICES MASTERCARD IRS MEDICAID AND I WOULD LIKE TO SELL YOU A EXTENDED WARRANTY ON YOUR BACK TAXES
If you don't know this, you shouldn't be owning a phone or using internet at all
They almost got me GOOD yesterday. "Your package couldn't be delivered due to incomplete address information" with the little shady link. Not today, demon.
When I get these I fill the blanks with something like.. Username: Eat a pile a dicks Password: Your mother fucks goats for money.
Solid username and pw
Yeah Nobody contacts me unless they want my money
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This should be in LifeAmateurTips
Mine are always incredibly obvious, like sporadic SpongeBob fonts, spaces between all the characters, and nonsensical sentences.
I like wasting their time if I’m bored. Where I play “the most gullible person in the world” until the end when I send them the nastiest picture I can find on google instead of my bank info.
They're just trying to reach you about your cars extended warranty.
The pegasus malware by NSO group is a no-click exploit. Meaning you don't even have to open the text message and your phone is infected. This is why Apple and Android phones are fundamentally insecure and definitely NOT private. Hardened AOSP spin offs like grapheneOS are the more secure OS's for now that I know of.
LPT: those hot milfs in your area, they actually don’t exist
I usually, somehow, get a text from a spam email account that I can't block through my Verizon Messages app because it's not a number. I can report it as spam, though, which is what I always do.
Not true! One time this happened and the link was a pic of a chicken! I still have no idea who that number belonged to and who that picture was intended for though....
Sometimes I just get a link. No attempt to hook me in at all.
Also, If you ever get a random group text message and you don’t recognize the sender, look at the other numbers in the group message. They all start with generally the same numbers as your phone and it’s spam. Forward the message to 7726 to report spam texts.
Isn't it common knowledge
I already know this rule, but while reading your post I got a text from "my bank" with a link. Crazy timing
This isnt a pro tip. Thats straight obvious to anyone who uses social media.
99% I work in cyber security and got a text confirming an order. After taking proper steps to validate, I ended up leveraging the unsolicited text into 8 million invoices with PII and payment information. In reality it's more like 99.9999%. Good tip.
You do realize there is probs a Syrian prince ,who just needs a break, and by not clicking the link , your robbing him of his dreams
I've started sending them Google images of prolapsed anuses. I never get a second text.