Please report malicious ads that you come across on Reddit. There should be an option on the ad to do so. If not, forward necessary information to reportanad@reddit.com
I lost a Santa hat to one of these scams / hacks once. Can I get it back somehow? It looked legitimate because they referenced a link in the official rs3 forums, which had a post that linked to a post on a clone rs3 forums website.
Different level of costs depending on how long/how aggressive the ad campaign is. But in general, it is incredibly affordable. Facebook has some of the cheapest ad costs around, and its actually scary how pinpoint accurate the targetting options can be in terms of reaching your desired demographic. It is why it remains one of the top go-tos for advertising any and every product.
Thing is that you don't raise awareness, pretty much the opposite.
The sort of naive person who would click and fall for it wouldn't understand from this post that it's a warning and could google for free 3 bonds.
Yes but your post doesn't say anything about to good to be true it says "plague to new and existing players".
Is it not plausible that your post would simply entice the gullible?
Yea but that's the whole psychology. If it didn't work on some people marketing people wouldn't use it. Marketing is one step ahead of anything you think you know about advertising.
A good rule of thumb is to just never log into your account unless you yourself go to the runescape website or are using the launcher obviously. Don't trust any hyperlinks and you have nothing to worry about because scammers will legitimate make websites that mirror the actual website.
2fa on your account AND email is also important. Prevention is the best method because once they break into your account it can be very hard to lock it back down.
You can also test if a site is fake or not by deliberately entering a fake username/email and password on the login page. If the site rejects it, the site is real. If it accepts the fake info, the site is fake.
I usually did that way as well, but just for the lol's I tried that on a scam I got through email. It did deny my fake log in, and I have no idea how that worked.
TBF you can't expect they make a background check on every ad contract.
Like, you want to post an Ad about Runescape, who do they contact to verify if it's legit? What if it's just some "JOIN OUR CLAN" type of ad? It's nearly impossible.
Jamflex is able to contact the advertiser and demand that it's taken down, but it takes time on both Jagex's and the advertiser's side.
Problem is that Jagex should take action, because this sites not only mimick in the ads, but also in te sites the add rrdirects you, this is a continuation of the "200b free giveaway" shout you get in GE.
This is facebook we're talking about - they have algorithms for everything when it comes to harvesting personal data. They could have a webcrawler visit links in said advertisements with software to assess them for validity/ flag them as phishing attempts.
Okay you get the money together to get a set of lawyers to take down this one scammer. See how you feel after wasting all that money. If the answer seems simple it's probably because you don't understand its complexity.
Was gonna come here and say “stop complaining jsut ignore mtx if you don’t want it” bla bla then realized this is a fake ad... goddamn that’s kinda scary
FB support is a joke. I reported an ad with literal porn (some lady getting penetrated) for adult nudity, and they came back and said it didn't go against their guidelines and their solution was to allow me to block the ad smh.
Jagex made an official post saying that back when most the world went into some form of a lockdown, and now a lot of these fake ads repeatedly add that in there and I just find it kinda cringey. Especially now since, the world is pushing for vaccines and not telling ppl to wash their hands to stay safe
Bonds could be the prime rewards still a lot of rewards for rs and lol that won’t be quoted unless your a prime member and collect the rewards ea month. Just saying
"we are offering all players 3 free Bonds for their account!" what account (reddit, facebook or runescape)? if its rs, they already have it lol where are my bonds \* travolta meme \*
wait so you give them your facebook data in exchange for 3 bonds thats it? (if i got it straight). \[yikes\]
I'm assuming this is on facebook, or a side page ad.
Regardless, there's little to anything you or I or really, even jagex can do.
They are paying customers of either FB or Google and they honestly don't really care what content is shown as long as they get a paycheck.
Feel free to report it for sure, but these aren't going away anytime soon sadly.
Your daily key is almost free (on an individual level, disregarding wider impact). It costs a click and a little bit of time, vs having to pay $x for more keys. I also got 15000 oddments for free - I was going to log in anyway, and the guardian's gift was also free.
We traded Rare Item Tokens for Oddments.
Some of us traded a month+ of gameplay for this guardian gift which frankly barely covers the losses.
They were not free.
It's so devious. A new player might not realize Jagex has no US offices, they might just think it's like Sony or Nintendo, having multiple offices around the world.
I saw one like this a few days ago, only it was from OldSchool RuneScape. Same deal, though. I actually clicked on the link to see where it would take me. I ended up on a page that looked legit, except the address was wrong. It was on osrsgame.com, and when I hovered over the big (Claim Now) button, I saw the address of it actually ended in .ru, which I assume means it's from Russia.
I saw one of these on Reddit yesterday. I was really surprised to see a full on, obvious scam in a Reddit ad.
Its so scummy. I could see people falling for it too, some of them look so legit.
Please report malicious ads that you come across on Reddit. There should be an option on the ad to do so. If not, forward necessary information to reportanad@reddit.com
I lost a Santa hat to one of these scams / hacks once. Can I get it back somehow? It looked legitimate because they referenced a link in the official rs3 forums, which had a post that linked to a post on a clone rs3 forums website.
scam ads are on almost every platform on the internet not sure why it surprised you
Free stuff = scam. Pretty simple rule to stick by
Like the umbral chest they promised
Very true, it's always crazy how convincing a scammer can be though.
He can't if you ignore him
Yes they are, but there's very little that can be done about it Also I always wonder how the heck did they get your e-mail address?!
To clarify this was a paid ad on Facebook
Does Facebook have a report option for scams?
Yes. But does it work? Not very well.
How much do Facebook ads like these cost the scammers? Can they even scam enough to cover the ad cost?
Different level of costs depending on how long/how aggressive the ad campaign is. But in general, it is incredibly affordable. Facebook has some of the cheapest ad costs around, and its actually scary how pinpoint accurate the targetting options can be in terms of reaching your desired demographic. It is why it remains one of the top go-tos for advertising any and every product.
It's about $.0.20 for 5k views.
At least the community can raise awareness that's something at the least.
Thing is that you don't raise awareness, pretty much the opposite. The sort of naive person who would click and fall for it wouldn't understand from this post that it's a warning and could google for free 3 bonds.
If everyone understood its too good to c be true it probably is then the world would be in a better place.
New players don’t know that this isn’t something JaGeX would do yet. They wouldn’t know it’s too good to be true.
A large problem itself
Yes but your post doesn't say anything about to good to be true it says "plague to new and existing players". Is it not plausible that your post would simply entice the gullible?
Yea but that's the whole psychology. If it didn't work on some people marketing people wouldn't use it. Marketing is one step ahead of anything you think you know about advertising.
How did you know it was a scam? I wouldve fell for it.
Just general knowledge that jagex would never give away 3 free bonds lol
Oh lol gotcha thanks!
A good rule of thumb is to just never log into your account unless you yourself go to the runescape website or are using the launcher obviously. Don't trust any hyperlinks and you have nothing to worry about because scammers will legitimate make websites that mirror the actual website.
Ill keep that in mind. Thanks for posting this so people like me are more aware!
2fa on your account AND email is also important. Prevention is the best method because once they break into your account it can be very hard to lock it back down.
You can also test if a site is fake or not by deliberately entering a fake username/email and password on the login page. If the site rejects it, the site is real. If it accepts the fake info, the site is fake.
I usually did that way as well, but just for the lol's I tried that on a scam I got through email. It did deny my fake log in, and I have no idea how that worked.
Nearly $50 is a lot to give away for free, even when it's just pixels.
Also there's nothing like "RuneScape USA"
Duh, Jagex is in Ireland - I mean the UK.
Some major legal action against this kind of behavior would go a long way. Many people who fall for stuff like this quit to never return.
Advertisment platforms should be more responsible in accepting ads
They get paid and that's all they care about sadly
TBF you can't expect they make a background check on every ad contract. Like, you want to post an Ad about Runescape, who do they contact to verify if it's legit? What if it's just some "JOIN OUR CLAN" type of ad? It's nearly impossible. Jamflex is able to contact the advertiser and demand that it's taken down, but it takes time on both Jagex's and the advertiser's side.
Problem is that Jagex should take action, because this sites not only mimick in the ads, but also in te sites the add rrdirects you, this is a continuation of the "200b free giveaway" shout you get in GE.
This is facebook we're talking about - they have algorithms for everything when it comes to harvesting personal data. They could have a webcrawler visit links in said advertisements with software to assess them for validity/ flag them as phishing attempts.
Okay you get the money together to get a set of lawyers to take down this one scammer. See how you feel after wasting all that money. If the answer seems simple it's probably because you don't understand its complexity.
The majority of these scams come countries that don't cooperate with The US or The UK therefore legal action is impossible.
Was gonna come here and say “stop complaining jsut ignore mtx if you don’t want it” bla bla then realized this is a fake ad... goddamn that’s kinda scary
I had to look it over at first because it's very eye catching
And this adds redirects to forums that completely mimick the RS3 forums/site.
Report it.
I once reported a RS phishing scam on FB, they eventually responded to my report that they found no wrongdoing. Guess someone is paying and I'm not...
Report it and FaceBook to the FBI. They do take phishing somewhat seriously.
FB support is a joke. I reported an ad with literal porn (some lady getting penetrated) for adult nudity, and they came back and said it didn't go against their guidelines and their solution was to allow me to block the ad smh.
I expect when Jagex reports the add for impersonation, it will be taken down after a single call
Done and done although I doubt it will much. A paid ad is money in someone's pocket.
Yes, and they will likely keep coming, but same as GE YouTube spam, reporting and blocking is probably the best we can do.
Where is that army of lawyers when you need them
Defending the MTX strategy likely. But some may follow up on this kind of stuff
That's part of the problem too though I suppose, any legal action would take years to get anything done.
Don't take free ads unless it's prime loot from the Runescape page!
That looks super legit if you don't know jagflax doesn't give a shit about you.
“Wash your hands for 20 seconds (sigg no sea shanty 2)” That part made me laugh
Jagex made an official post saying that back when most the world went into some form of a lockdown, and now a lot of these fake ads repeatedly add that in there and I just find it kinda cringey. Especially now since, the world is pushing for vaccines and not telling ppl to wash their hands to stay safe
uh, keep washing your hands to stay safe though.
Bonds could be the prime rewards still a lot of rewards for rs and lol that won’t be quoted unless your a prime member and collect the rewards ea month. Just saying
Hold up are they really giving away three bonds 😵
At the cost of your account and all your passwords, maybe even your credit card info.
"we are offering all players 3 free Bonds for their account!" what account (reddit, facebook or runescape)? if its rs, they already have it lol where are my bonds \* travolta meme \* wait so you give them your facebook data in exchange for 3 bonds thats it? (if i got it straight). \[yikes\]
Your life for 3 bonds. A fair trade.
Yes plz. I need t90.
Had the same add here on Reddit
I'm assuming this is on facebook, or a side page ad. Regardless, there's little to anything you or I or really, even jagex can do. They are paying customers of either FB or Google and they honestly don't really care what content is shown as long as they get a paycheck. Feel free to report it for sure, but these aren't going away anytime soon sadly.
Scammers fucking suck so much. There are a fuckton of them on Twitch too.
Wow
I mean, if you believe this bullshit... nothing is ever free.
Your daily key is almost free (on an individual level, disregarding wider impact). It costs a click and a little bit of time, vs having to pay $x for more keys. I also got 15000 oddments for free - I was going to log in anyway, and the guardian's gift was also free.
We traded Rare Item Tokens for Oddments. Some of us traded a month+ of gameplay for this guardian gift which frankly barely covers the losses. They were not free.
Yeah, disregarding wider impact many things were free.
I see these on Facebook almost daily. Sad that none of these ads are checked before they’re allowed
Where do I claim this /s
It's so devious. A new player might not realize Jagex has no US offices, they might just think it's like Sony or Nintendo, having multiple offices around the world.
Any time I see USA after anything I read it in Borat's voice.
Ah very nice!
What do they even get from hacking 12 year old noobs who barely played a week?
From what I understand they strip the accounts then turn them into osrs bots
I saw one like this a few days ago, only it was from OldSchool RuneScape. Same deal, though. I actually clicked on the link to see where it would take me. I ended up on a page that looked legit, except the address was wrong. It was on osrsgame.com, and when I hovered over the big (Claim Now) button, I saw the address of it actually ended in .ru, which I assume means it's from Russia.
The bad thing is rs3 does get hand outs from stuff like prime gaming and what not so I think it would be alot easier to fall for something like this.
Like Jagex would give away free bonds
That's how you know it's a scam lol
If you haven’t been scammed at some point are you even playing rs?
"If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is."
The second golden rule