Facebook Scam Claims Tesco Is Giving Away £45 Vouchers
A post circulating on Facebook claims that British multinational groceries and general merchandise retailer Tesco is giving away vouchers priced at £45 to every family who follows their instructions.
The instructions on the post insist that you visit a website where you are asked to answer a quick 3-question survey. Once you complete the survey you are instructed to share the page on Facebook, comment “Thanks!” on the post, and then click Claim Voucher to claim your £45 Tesco voucher. However, when you click the Claim Voucher link you will be forwarded to another website that contains a stream of never-ending surveys used to gather more of your details.
To be clear, the £45 Tesco Facebook post is fraudulent and the party who created the post are not affiliated with Tesco; It is likely that Tesco has no idea about the post or the party behind it. If you follow the instructions you will not receive a £45 voucher to Tesco, or any prize for that matter.
Scams like these are very common and don’t seem to be going away anytime soon. Scammers who create these type of posts usually publish many at the same time using the names of different companies around the world.
The primary objective of this scam is to trick you into submitting your personal information such as your full name, email address, and home address to dodgy websites such as http://ie.tesco-clubcard.com. The information you submit to the sites may be sold and shared with various parties, including questionable marketing agencies who may barrage you with unwanted phone calls, email messages, text messages, and physical letters in your mailbox at home.
Although the primary objective of the scam is to basically phish your personal information, extorting currency from a victim is not out of reach. Advanced-fee-fraud is a crime closely associated with Facebook scams like this.
If you followed the instructions on the Facebook posts, liked the page, commented on the post, and whatever else you needed to do, you may become a target. The scammers are aware that they may be able to scam you again since you fell for their scam in the first place. In this scenario, the scammers may send you a message over Facebook that says you won a prize; However, in order for you to obtain the prize, you will need to send an advance payment to cover the shipping fees (or whatever fake reason the scammers come up with). If an advanced fee is paid, it will not be returned and no prize will be rewarded.
Example of post:
£45 Tesco Voucher
Tesco is giving away £45 Vouchers to every family! One Voucher / Family
