Beware of Southwest Airlines Facebook scams that are designed to phish personal information and spread malware. Southwest Airlines Facebook scams are growing every day and there is a variety of different types of Southwest Airlines scams on the social media website.
Most Southwest Airlines Facebook scams claim that Facebook users can acquire free Southwest Airlines tickets by following some sort of instruction. The Southwest Airlines scams use Facebook events and fake Facebook pages to make their faux giveaways seem legitimate. But these fake Southwest Airlines Facebook events and pages are entirely fraudulent and designed to trick users into visiting malicious websites or providing their personal details.
A Southwest Airlines Facebook scam associated to a survey scam usually asks for personal information such as email address, full names, and home addresses. This information is used for a variety of marketing purposes and will result in unwanted email spam, junk mail at home, and if a phone number is provided, phone calls from telemarketers and questionable parties if the personal information is forfeited over.
Other Southwest Airlines Facebook scams may ask users to visit third-party websites via links, or in some cases, Facebook messages. Third-party websites may host malware and automatic web attacks. Automatic web attacks, such as the Facebook Manual Share web attack can “hack” a Facebook profile and use the profile to access personal information about the victim and their friends. When cyber criminals have access to a Facebook profile they can also post and send messages on the victim’s behalf, as well as add and remove friends and Facebook likes.
Another concern is that these types of scams may result in rogue Facebook apps being installed onto the affected Facebook account.
A current Southwest Airlines Facebook scam uses a fake Southwest Airlines Facebook page to create a fake event titled “Get 2 Air tickets for 0 cost.” The faux event claims that Facebook users can receive 2 free Southwest Airlines tickets by joining the event, inviting friends to the event, and commenting on the event. It also states “Please provide your Name and shipping address to receive tickets on link in the first post.” It says that if you invite 200 friends you can get 2 free tickets and 4 tickers for all your friends and that tickets will arrive in a matter of 4 days.
A post created on this fake Facebook event also asks users to visit a survey scam website designed to gather email addresses and broad information, such as age range.
Southwest Airlines Scam Help
If you have been compromised by a Southwest Airlines scam on Facebook there are steps you can take to make sure your computer is not infected with malware and to ensure that your Facebook account is safe.
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- Scan your computer for malware using reputable Anti-Malware software such as Malwarebytes Anti-Malware.
- Change your Facebook password by visiting Settings > General > Password.
- Remove rogue Facebook applications by visiting Settings > Apps.
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