Lottery scams spreading on social media – how to spot a scam

Various lottery scams are widely spreading on social media. Be especially suspicious of contacts that involve a 'friend' of yours notifying you of a joint lottery prize. Never give your user identifiers or passwords to another person.

In lottery scams, criminals approach their victims through hacked social media accounts. A message's sender will appear to be your friend but is actually a fraudster. 

In the scam, a fraudster pretending to be a friend will ask for their victim's phone number after which communication may continue also outside the original communication channel. The fraudster will tell the victim about the possibility of participating in a lottery and winning a large amount of money. After getting the phone number, they promise to be in contact in case the victim wins a prize.

After a while, a message will arrive, informing about winning a prize and requesting an account number, bank user identifiers and a password for its payment. Never give any of your identifiers related to digital services to anyone.

Once in possession of the identifiers, the fraudster will initiate payment confirmation requests the purpose of which is to deceive the victim into believing that they concern incoming payments. In reality, the further payment confirmations are for outgoing payments from the victim's account. Always carefully check all further payment confirmations and make sure to confirm only such payments that you have made yourself.

If you suspect that your identifiers have fallen into the wrong hands, deactivate them immediately by calling OP Deactivation Service at 0100 0555 (open 24/7).