At the moment, fraudsters have set up shop on Facebook and are pretending to be Facebook!

We received the following information from various Facebook users: “Dear Mimikama team, when I opened the Facebook app on my smartphone and clicked on a link from a daily newspaper, the following screen opened, I suspect that it is fake acts, right?”

This is the following browser window:

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For the Facebook user it looks like they have won a prize. But that's not the case, because rip-offs are hiding behind it and not Facebook!

The user can now choose between various vouchers, such as those from Amazon, Ikea or Aldi/Lidl! DANGER! But as soon as you “activate” a voucher here, you are redirected to a competition form where you as a user have to reveal all of your data, which brings us back to the topic of “data trading”!

How can a user avoid such fake advertisements?

Basically, almost every user knows the moment when you suddenly open an advertising window on Facebook while you're using your smartphone. Without knowing anything, you surf your news stream on your smartphone using the installed Facebook app. Suddenly you see a status post including a link to a website that you would like to follow, but this is not possible immediately. The reason: An advertising window (pop-up) is placed exactly ABOVE the respective article and you can no longer read it. Annoyed, you now look for an “X” or “Close” button. The only option left is to close the app or, in the worst case, restart your phone. The cause of this is the Facebook browser / the in-app browser.

We know the problem and can show you a solution that has already worked for many Facebook users.

First of all, let us know what you actually see here: These are advertising banners on websites that manipulated by online criminals .

What can you do about it as an affected user?

Disable Facebook’s “In App Browser”. Facebook always opens references/links within its own app.
  1. To do this, open the Facebook app on your cell phone.
  2. Access the app's settings via the three-bar icon in the top menu bar.
  3. Scroll down to “Settings and Privacy”.
  4. and here directly below to the “Settings”
  5. If you now tap on “Media and Contacts”, you will now find…
  6. ...here the option “Links are opened externally” is available.
  7. Activate the option to be able to open external links via the Facebook app as usual with your favorite Android browser.

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Note: The display of this option may vary depending on the app version.

You should also follow the following steps:

  1. To be on the safe side, you should generally have so-called value-added services blocked by your cell phone provider, because you can never be sure that such advertising banners/apps will not be active in the background
  2. also strongly recommend third-party block
  3. Delete the “history” and “saved website content” as well as the “cookies” directly in the browser.
  4. Think about an antivirus app


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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 )