‘Win a Toyota Land Cruiser’ Facebook Scam
A fake Toyota Facebook page claims to be giving away a Toyota Land Cruiser to 500 fans who like their page, share their post, and comment “DONE.”
According to a Facebook post published by a fake Toyota Facebook page, Toyota is giving away 500 brand new Toyota Land Cruisers to Facebook users who like a the fake Toyota Facebook page, share their post, and write “DONE” in the comments of the post. The post shared by the fake Toyota Facebook page claims that Toyota decided to gift brand new Toyota Land Cruisers on their birthday.
Image of the post:
Transcript from the post:
Good News for Toyota Lovers
On the birthday of Toyota the company decided to gift brand new Land Cruiser to their 500 Facebook fans. To win Land Cruiser just complete the steps.
Step 1: – Like our page
Step 2: – Share this post
Step 3: write DONE in comments
More share more get chance to win
GOOD LUCK
However, the post is fraudulent. The fake Toyota Facebook page is not associated with Toyota and they are not giving away brand new Toyota Land Cruiser to Facebook users who follow instructions published in a post. Toyota has several legitimate and verified Facebook accounts including Toyota Global and Toyota USA (or whichever country you live in).
The purpose of the ‘Win a Toyota Land Cruiser’ Facebook scam is to obtain as many likes as they can for the deceptive Facebook page.
Fake giveaways like this can oftentimes accumulate a lot of Facebook likes from real Facebook accounts. This allows the Facebook page to reach a larger audience when they publish posts.
The scammers can use the Facebook page for several purposes. They can use it to launch survey-scams designed to phish information that victims submit to them and to conduct other scams to a larger pool of victims.
In other cases, the scammers can sell the Facebook pages to unknown parties. The more likes the page has, the more it can be sold for on the black market.
One of the biggest concerns with Facebook scams like this is that they can be used to “hunt” targets to scam online. A scammer might contact someone who liked, shared, and commented on their post telling them that they won the prize. The scammer will then ask the Facebook user for an advanced payment to cover shipping or something else. When the Facebook user pays the scammer the scammer then moves onto the next person and the Facebook user does not get a reward. This is called advanced payment fraud, advanced fee fraud, advanced fee scam, or advanced fee scheme and it is very common on social media.
This has been officially researched and concluded to be a scam.
- The post claims Toyota is giving away Land Cruisers on their birthday but Toyota was founded August 28, 1937.
- The post was not published by a verified Toyota Facebook page.
- Verified Toyota social media accounts do not acknowledge the giveaway.
- Verified Toyota social media accounts do not have a history of giving away vehicles to people who like, share, or comment on their content.
- Verified businesses in general do not have a history of giving away prizes to people who like, share, or comment on their content.
- The post is similar to most like-farming scams.
In the future, be aware of these points. And, in the social media world, if something seems too good to be true, it usually is.
What to do if you fell for a scam
Do not share or like the post. This only promotes it to more people which is how these scams are usually spread in the first place. If you did, visit your activity and unlike the post.
If you completed online surveys associated there is not much that you can do. However, if you supplied your personal banking or credit information to a survey it is strongly suggested to contact your bank or credit institution for assistance.
If you sent an advanced payment in order to receive a prize contact your bank or credit card and file a claim against the transaction. Explain to your bank or the credit card company what happened in order to receive assistance for the matter.
If you used an online payment service to make an advanced payment contact them and let them know what happened. It is possible that you will be able to receive your money back from them.
Furthermore, terminate all association with the Facebook page. Unlike the Facebook page, report the Facebook page, tell friends that you might have tagged about the scam, and even change your Facebook password for safe measure.
