PITTSBURGH — A new scheme is popping up on Facebook, and it uses the video chat feature on the social media platform.
“People are falling for it, and I see how,” said Renaldo Pearson. “It has literal face value.”
Renaldo Pearson received a Facebook message from a friend he hadn’t heard from in a while.
“Brad sends me a generic, ‘Hey. What’s up bruh?,’” Pearson said.
The conversation went back and forth. Then, Brad asked for $200 and followed up the request with a video chat.
“There were red flags, but when this video call was initiated, that changed the game for me because I saw his face,” said Pearson. “I saw video of him on the other end, just like a FaceTime, moving. I just couldn’t hear the audio, and he couldn’t hear me.”
The video chat lasted 29 seconds, but an elaborate story started building. Eventually, Pearson decided to pick up the phone and call Brad’s sister, since he didn’t have Brad’s number.
“I said (that) I got a message requesting $200 from Brad,” said Pearson. “And she’s like, ‘Oh my goodness. We’re getting calls,’ and she said this person (is) posing as Brad. I said, ‘Wait, it’s not Brad at all?’”
It turns out that the same thing happened to Brad Patterson with a different Facebook friend.
“I could not hear him,” said Patterson. “And that’s when I start doing like this (motioning to his ear). Now we come to find out they were videotaping me.”
Patterson says he didn’t ask him for any money. Instead, he asked him for a code.
“Right when I said ‘what code,’” said Patterson, “a code came to my phone, and I sent it to him, and I got booted off Facebook.”
The scheme got control of Brad’s Facebook page and used his page plus the video of him to attempt to get money from at least 15 of his Facebook friends.
“One of my friends from the D.C. area,” said Patterson. “He actually sent (money) to the Cash App (account) this guy provided. Another one of my friends actually sent the money to my real Cash App, and I was able to send it back to her.”
“This is next-level scheming,” said Pearson. “Next-level hacking. Next-level fraud.”
After experiencing this, Pearson and Patterson wanted to share this advice: don’t send money, or before you do, verify by calling the person or a family member like Renaldo did; and never share a security code.
When Channel 11 reached out to the Better Business Bureau of Western Pennsylvania, a spokesperson said they haven’t heard about this exact scheme locally, but did want to remind people to watch out for “deepfakes.” Deepfakes use artificial intelligence technology to create seemingly real videos or audio clips, mimicking a person’s face, voice or both.
Download the FREE WPXI News app for breaking news alerts.
Follow Channel 11 News on Facebook and Twitter. | Watch WPXI NOW
TRENDING NOW:
©2022 Cox Media Group
/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/cmg/XCUXZC2XYZHCRGNNGKFEX6U3LQ.png)
