Fake verified Facebook pages luring users into clicking malicious links

Facebook verified accounts that have been compromised are now acting as Meta, buying advertisements on the site, and allegedly tricking users into clicking dubious download links.

Recently, a few trusted Facebook pages were breached, and it was discovered that the compromised accounts were spreading suspected malware via platform-approved and bought adverts. The accounts, though, ought to be simple to identify since they occasionally impersonated Facebook.

Some of the advertisements were initially seen by social media expert Matt Navarra, who shared them on Twitter.

"@Meta, how did this ad get approved? He tweeted an image of a phoney Meta ad and the words, "Verified account imitating Meta misleading consumers into downloading shady software.

It wasn't a singular incident; a second verified Facebook account was also compromised and is now misrepresenting as "Google AI" and directing Facebook users to bogus links for Bard, Google's AI chatbot.

Before the account name was changed on April 29, that account belonged to Indian singer and actress Miss Pooja. More than 7 million people followed the account, which had been active for at least ten years, according to a TechCrunch report.

'Meta Ads' and 'Meta Ads Manager' are only a couple of the official-sounding pages that have been hijacked.

Tens of thousands of followers received suspicious links from such accounts.

A spokeswoman for Meta reportedly stated that they devote a lot of energy to identifying and avoiding frauds and hacks.

Scammers are always attempting to circumvent our security measures, despite the fact that many of the enhancements we've made are difficult to detect because they prevent consumers from experiencing problems in the first place, the representative was quoted as saying.

The public's interest in ChatGPT is being exploited by malware developers last week, who are utilising this curiosity to persuade users to download malicious software and browser extensions.

The business related this phenomenon to bitcoin frauds since both strategies prey on people's curiosity and trust to get private data.

It discovered about ten malware families using tools like ChatGPT and others to hijack accounts online.

"Over the past several months, we've investigated and taken action against malware strains taking advantage of people's interest in OpenAI's ChatGPT to trick them into installing malware pretending to provide AI functionality," Meta wrote in its security report.