Fraud Alert: Vast – Beware

I just love to enter giveaways, so every time I get a notification that I have won, I go “yippee“”. But I go to the ends to make sure that there is a protocol in place before I resort to going to the requests of some bloggers/sweepstakes administrators. The rules of such sweeps claim different ways and means of collecting on a win.

This incident here, A fellow website has been hacked via their Facebook page and through Messenger with Vast.gg whereby the Facebook page was bogus and through a Messenger notification I was contacted that I had won and I followed the hackers rules and used a gift card worth only $5.00 in order to do some investigating. The page connected with a company called “Oatymedia” of which is the page the illegal transaction could happen on. UPDATE: Oatymedia responded with the following information: There were re-directs to their website. I am showing a version of what happened, so that if you have been contacted by a hacker about winning, you know that if they want credit card and other personal information, that it is indeed bogus.

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If you have been contacted on behalf of Vast about winning, chances are you have been contacted by the hacker. Make sure that you NEVER, ever give personal information to collect on a prize. Also like I did, I limited the damages to a card worth only $5.00 purposely because it is the expense of being part of a watchdog group. In this case the persons were scoping people who entered on a site, be it looking at posts on Twitter, Facebook or other social media. Sometimes, contact can be established from what looks like a company that you did enter a contest, sweepstakes or giveaway. Also, because it was a hacker telling me I won, of course, I did not win!! Companies whose websites or other media have been compromised do NOT have to make good on any promises made by persons operating under illegal means. The good news is: I am not new to this. I followed protocol of using a gift card worth a low value, and I am limited of the damages that could have been caused to me. I could have been through identity theft, even.