Here’s a Twitter spam campaign which looks out for regional references in Tweets, then fires “you have won the Lottery” messages to lucky(?) recipients.
The above tweets say
This tweet is the winner of the March Twitter lottery from [username removed]. Claim your winnings at @_UK_Lottery_
Visiting the second spam profile (called UK Lottery Claim) reveals an account touting a large Twitter themed banner and a single Bio message:
You have been confirmed by our systems as the March Twitter Lottery winner from your city. Proceed to the link below to claim your winnings. USE THIS LINK [bit.ly URL removed]
The Bit.ly URL has had 3,318 clicks since yesterday.
It leads to
claimyourgifthere(dot)pw
which eventually redirects the clicker to a “voucher & win” sign-up, asking for name, email, DOB, home address and phone number. There’s a “guaranteed prize draw” mentioned, so I guess the prize for winning the so-called Twitter Lottery is…another lottery?
Both Twitter accounts have already been suspended. Giveaways are all well and good, but random spam sent your way rarely pays dividends. In fact, you could say it’s a bit of a gamble…
Christopher Boyd (Thanks to MrTom for sending over)
What has the internet come to….
I just got one of these so decided to look it up before entering any details. Pretty glad I did. It’s a shame scammers have resorted to using sites like Twitter to gather people’s data or even just ad revenue. Whatever happened to the good ol’ pop-up window that you could disable? Ah, back in the day…
I’ve decided long ago that “You’ve won…..a chance to win” is no reward at all and needs to be steered clear of.