This chain letter attracts with an outrageous headline: Donald Trump was arrested!? I'll have to take a closer look!
Users contacted us because they were unsure whether the following message was a chain letter or a real threat to their PC:
I received this copied text in a personal message from a FB friend asking what she could do.
Get the degree: If you get the picture of Donald Trump being arrested by the police…..don't open it!!!!….it's a virus!!!!
Is this really just a chain letter or is there actually a virus circulating via personal message?
In English-speaking countries, our colleagues from the websites “ Snopes ” and “ Hoax-Slayer ” had the pleasure of receiving exactly this warning in October 2016.
Messages like these are mentioned as an example:
WARNING OF A COMPUTER VIRUS: Breaking News. “Donald Trump arrested” Please if you see two police officers arresting Donald Trump on your computer screen, Do not click to read the news. It is a virus. Someone has done that and it has infected their computer. Please send to everyone in your contact list
COMPUTER VIRUS WARNING: BREAKING NEWS. “Donald Trump arrested” Please, if you see two police officers arresting Donald Trump on your screen, do not click on it to read this news. It's a virus. Someone has already done it and infected their computer. Please send this to everyone in your contact list
There are no documented reports that US President Donald Trump was arrested by the police, nor that this virus actually struck.
This message therefore falls into the category of chain letters that are intended to unsettle users.
Conclusion:
Scammers use scandalous headlines to trick users into clicking on links that can lead to malicious content. It is not uncommon for the names of well-known personalities to be misused.
Since there are no known cases that this image is really a virus, we can assume it is a chain letter.
The best way to deal with chain letters is to ignore them, delete them and stop sending them.
In the past, however, we have also been able to describe private messages that contain a malicious link and from which a preview image is generated. This could also be what is meant by the very vaguely written warning. However, we do not have any current incidents regarding this.
Source preview image: / Shutterstock.com
Notes:
1) This content reflects the current state of affairs at the time of publication. The reproduction of individual images, screenshots, embeds or video sequences serves to discuss the topic. 2) Individual contributions were created through the use of machine assistance and were carefully checked by the Mimikama editorial team before publication. ( Reason )