How to avoid the fake Guinness fridge offer that’s circulating on WhatsApp

If you receive a mes­sage on What­sApp promis­ing you a free fridge full of Guin­ness for Father’s Day, don’t fall for it. It’s a scam that aims to steal your per­son­al details and hijack your account.

The mes­sage claims that Guin­ness is giv­ing away fridges as part of a Father’s Day pro­mo­tion, and invites you to click on a link to take part in a quiz and find the ‘gold­en ticket’.

How­ev­er, the link leads to a fake web­site that has noth­ing to do with Guin­ness or its par­ent com­pa­ny Dia­geo, which has con­firmed that the pro­mo­tion is not genuine.

The web­site asks you to share the link with 20 friends or five What­sApp groups before you can claim your prize, which is a way of spread­ing the scam to more poten­tial victims.

It also asks you for your address and oth­er per­son­al infor­ma­tion, which could be used for iden­ti­ty theft or fraud.

To make mat­ters worse, the scam­mer who sent you the mes­sage may also try to take over your What­sApp account by pre­tend­ing to be your friend or some­one you know.

They will send you anoth­er mes­sage ask­ing you to for­ward them a six-dig­it code that you received from What­sApp by text. This code is actu­al­ly a ver­i­fi­ca­tion code that allows them to access your account and lock you out.

To pro­tect your­self from this scam, you should:

  • Delete the mes­sage and do not click on the link or share it with anyone
  • Report the mes­sage as spam to WhatsApp
  • Do not give out your per­son­al details or ver­i­fi­ca­tion code to anyone
  • Enable two-step ver­i­fi­ca­tion on your What­sApp account to add an extra lay­er of security
  • Con­tact Guin­ness or Dia­geo if you have any doubts about their promotions

Remem­ber, if some­thing sounds too good to be true, it prob­a­bly is. Stay safe and enjoy your Father’s Day.

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