Today, over 4.6 billion people use social media, representing 58.4% of all humans.
Businesses have also recognized the enormous potential of social media, with 73% of all SMBs investing time and money in these platforms. While these platforms are deeply ingrained in consumers’ daily lives, they are also home to opportunistic scammers and fraudsters who try to trick users with various scams.
As a brand, you should be aware of all these scams and how they can negatively impact your business.
However, it is not always easy to spot these scams.
Social media scams are prevalent on nearly every platform.
Losses from social media fraud accounted for 26% of total reported fraud losses in 2021. This figure represents a shocking 18-fold increase compared to the last four years. These scams are very difficult to detect, making them a lucrative option for malicious actors.
Let’s take a look at what factors contribute to the complexity of social media fraud.
Over 20 social media platforms that we manage daily.
There are over 20 social media platforms with over 250 million monthly active users (MAUs), and 7 social media platforms with over 1 billion.
These numbers are expected to increase further.
As the number of local social media platforms explodes, billions of new users are connecting to these growing networks. As each user connects, they also extend their employer’s digital landscape. The scale and complexity of this phenomenon has become a nightmare for IT security teams fighting social media fraud.
Understaffed and overworked, these teams are scammers who fly from site to site all waking hours to target an extended audience of employees, partners and brands involved. must be spent to stop
There are many types of scams and social media scams to watch out for.
Social media provides easy access to personal information and can facilitate various social media scams.
Pages and profiles sell pirated and counterfeit goods, carry out cryptocurrency, currency and gift card fraud, allow phishing and impersonating officers, and send false advertisements. Each scam on each platform requires different techniques to detect and eliminate, especially if each technique is aimed at targeting different audiences.
Social media is not governed by a common set of regulations.
Unlike websites, which are subject to regulatory scrutiny and globalized common management systems, social media platforms are largely unregulated.
Each platform has policies that govern what you can post, how you can post, and how you can report abuse. This means that his SOC team at the organization will have to approach each platform differently when it comes to brand impersonation instances.
Adding to the already massive workload, learning the regulatory details of more than 20 platforms is nearly impossible. Combine this with the sheer volume of posted content that security teams must scan for fraudulent activity, and you can understand why social media fraud is so difficult to detect.
Reporting and removing abusive posts on social media can be difficult.
If traditional website scrutiny techniques fail to detect social media fraud on social media platforms, SOC teams will need to develop new techniques for each platform.
Even after fraudulent and infringing posts have been identified, removing them is an entirely different task.
Each platform has a different definition of abusive posts and different procedures for removing such content. Additionally, these differences require tracking removal success metrics separately for each platform, complicating reporting and requiring many measurements to be reviewed each day.
The first step in stopping such scams is understanding how they work.
Here are some of the most popular scams that have defrauded social media users.
1. Lottery and gift card fraud
Lotteries and gift card scams prey on people’s greed for money.
In an attempt to make a quick buck, many unsuspecting victims take the bait. These scams usually start with unsolicited messages on his social media claiming to give away gift cards for popular brands. The message will likely direct the user to another page where they are asked to complete a basic task, such as forwarding the message to a friend. In some cases, it prompts for additional credentials and steals those credentials.
Lottery scams start similarly. They ask people to send their account information in order to complete the transaction, or they ask them to send small amounts of money to cover the transaction costs. Many victims lose thousands of dollars in the vain hope of winning big prizes in the end.
2. Officer Impersonation
In a prime example of business impersonation, Twitter impersonated tech company CEOs Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos in tweets asking them to invest in certain cryptocurrency accounts. Assuming this endorsement was genuine, the persuaded victims ended up transferring money to the criminal’s account.
In executive impersonation social media scams, criminals first create fake profiles that mimic real people. A wealth of publicly available information is used to create fake accounts impersonating influential people using photos, personal information, and even speech and tone of real people. This account is then used to send bogus messages and posts to people asking for money, and can also target employees and business relationships who are likely to respond.
3. Account Hacking
This is one of the most popular social media scams.
Many data breaches expose millions of social media credentials to criminals. These credentials are used to break into people’s accounts, hackers change passwords and lock the real owners out of accounts.
Once hacked, criminals gain access to users’ networks with the goal of extorting money or even compromising information.
4. Cryptocurrency investment fraud
This is a new scam that is gaining momentum with the popularity of many cryptocurrencies.
Scammers take advantage of people’s liability by posing as investment professionals and asking victims to transfer funds to their accounts. They invest these funds in cryptocurrencies, promising huge returns.
The anonymity of blockchain makes it difficult to track down criminals. 37% of reported social media fraud losses in 2021 were related to such investment fraud.
5. Social Media Phishing
Social media phishing can occur in many ways. Criminals have access to so many tactics and means of communication that it can be difficult to identify all the tactics that target employees and organizations.
In its most straightforward sense, social media phishing is when scammers send compelling messages containing interesting information. However, in order to access the information, you must enter your personal information. These details are stolen and used for other cyber crimes. These messages can be sent through various social media sites on both desktop and mobile devices.
Several social media scams fall into this category. Gossip scams, medical scams, photo scams, account deletion scams, Nigerian prince scams, and sojourn abroad scams are just a few of the common examples of social media phishing scams you’ve probably heard of.
6. Hidden or shortened URLs
Without proper verification, clicking on shortened URLs can lead to malicious websites.
These URLs don’t show full links, so it’s hard to tell where they go after clicking. Often, it is nefarious sites run by criminals that can mine your data or download malware onto your device.
We recommend using a URL extension service before clicking on a URL to see where it leads.
—> Click this link. i dare you. <—
7. Counterfeit and pirated products
According to the FTC, 45% of all reported losses in 2021 were related to online shopping fraud.
These social media scams sell counterfeit or counterfeit goods to unsuspecting consumers, take money up front, or never send the goods. Purchasing fraudulent products that interested customers never show up can cause a lot of reputational damage to your brand.
Posts or pages promoting such products should be identified and removed as soon as possible.
8. Quizzes and Other Information Mining Tactics
Data is one of the most coveted commodities of cybercriminals.
From engaging quizzes to engaging IQ tests, each one is set to mine data. There is no charge for these services, so there is value in the data collected.
These quizzes have clickbait titles, making them very compelling propositions. Once the quiz developers have the facts they need, they sell them on the dark web to other malicious actors.
9. Fake Job Listings
Another popular social media scam that businesses and users alike need to be aware of is fake job listings. This is when a hacker creates a fraudulent job listing on her LinkedIn (or other professional network) to entice people to apply. During the hiring process, hackers request personally identifiable information (PII) and other sensitive information (such as bank account information), which they typically provide to new employers. Once the information is received, the unsuspecting victim will never hear from the fake company again.
Fake job postings hurt both individuals and organizations. Companies that are imitated by criminals and set up fake job openings will face reputational damage from angry job seekers.
This type of social media scam has grown in popularity in recent years thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic and the associated shifts in the workforce. As more people look for fully remote jobs, it’s becoming more common not to meet potential new employers face-to-face before sharing sensitive data, making it easier for hackers to commit these scams. I’m here.
With over half of the population using social media, social media is a platform that selfish businesses cannot afford to ignore.
But the larger the market, social media is even more closely associated with scams, scams, and cyberthreats. It’s nearly impossible to deal with manually. The scale, sophistication, and granularity of threat actors are simply unmanageable through traditional SOC practices.
It requires a new approach, backed by automation and machine learning.
Cybersecurity professionals can use automation to build workflows that inspect these platforms daily, scanning every post, image, ad, and other content to detect fraudulent activity. Automate the discovery process so your team can tackle more cognitive security tasks.
The second layer is the machine learning layer.
These advanced algorithms can analyze, detect and mark suspicious activity. In fact, it can even be trained to identify many scams, including content abuse, counterfeit goods, piracy, and false advertising.
Together, the entire detection, detection, and resolution process is automated and can run 24/7, ensuring your customers are protected from social media fraud.
Bolster offers a comprehensive, AI-powered social media protection solution that enables organizations to stay vigilant across 14 social media platforms.
Automatically detect and remove fraudulent activity, including organic posts, paid ads, and fake executive profiles.
You can also remove malicious external links posted on social media, remove phishing and scam offers, and remove impersonation profiles, all in minutes.
Additionally, all collected data and evidence is displayed in an intuitive visual dashboard, making it easy for security teams to track all activity.
To learn more about how Bolster can combine AI and ML to protect your brand and its customers on social media, book your demo today.
*** This is a blog written by Market Research – Bolster AI’s Security Bloggers Network syndicated blog. Read the original post: https://bolster.ai/blog/social-media-scams
