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A scam on YouTube reported this week is consistent with the age-old saying: if it sounds too good to be true, well, you know the rest.
On Wednesday, YouTube star Philip DeFranco warned its more than 6 million subscribers to not trust any direct message claiming to come from his account that promises rewards for clicking on a specified link.
"If you have a message from me or any other creator on YouTube that looks like this, it's most likely someone who's trying to rip you off," DeFranco said in his video. The messages vary slightly, but in general, they thank the subscriber for commenting on a video and say that it was randomly selected to receive a "gift".
The scam seems to be a fairly typical online phishing scheme, which targets individuals to disclose personal information, such as credit card numbers and social security numbers.
Read more: Do you think you can spot phishing mail from a hacker? Take the Google quiz and discover
YouTube did not provide an official comment to Business Insider about the problem, but told us the community forum where the company had recently responded to a complaint from a user on the subject.
"We are aware and are implementing additional measures to combat identity theft," wrote a YouTube employee. "In the meantime, we deleted the accounts identified as spam." The company also said that users could block any account that spammed them and that the channels in question could be reported via its reporting tool.
Friday afternoon, 188 YouTube users on the community page said they cracked for the scam.
According to The Verge, subscribers of other popular YouTube stars, including James Charles, Jeffree Star and Bhad Bhabie, have also reported this scam.
Do you have a tip? Contact this reporter via Signal at +1 (209) 730-3387, e-mail [email protected] or Twitter DM at @nickbastone.
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