91�ȱ�

Even if it hasn’t happened to you, you probably know someone who’s had their social media account hacked or stolen by someone. It’s a common scam, which has been on the rise in the UK in recent years.There are plenty of scams out there and they affect us all, even the most tech-savvy of us. We asked Nick Stapleton, investigative journalist and reporter on 91�ȱ� One’s Scam Interceptors to talk us through 3 common scams and how you can protect yourself from them – this is what he has to say.

1. Social Media Hacking

Social media hacking is when a person works out or steals the password to your social media account to log in without you knowing. Once they’re in, they can change your contact details, and suddenly you can find yourself locked out of your own account. What sometimes happens then, if it's a scammer who has done this, is that they then contact you and claim that if you pay them money, they will give you the account back, but even if you did pay the money, it’s likely they would just demand more and never give the account back.

How to protect yourself:

• Set strong passwords for everything, not just social media, because it makes it harder for hackers to use technology to crack the code. Always use passwords which are over 8 letters or numbers in total, with at least one capital letter and one ‘special character’, like ! or ?

• Make sure you have ‘two factor authentication’ (sometimes shortened as 2FA) set up on your social media accounts and anywhere else you can. This is a complicated name for a simple thing – it just means that there are at least 2 ways for you to prove who you are and access your account. This can be an email address plus a mobile number for example.

2. Account recovery scams

If you post that your account has been hacked, another thing that can happen is that other scammers can then reply offering to help you regain access in return for a small fee, but this is also a scam called an ‘account recovery scam’. What can happen here is that the small fee, if you paid it, could become more and more money, and you wouldn’t get the access to your account that was promised.

How to protect yourself:

• It’s best-practice to keep your social media profile set to private and to not accept friend or message requests from anyone you don’t know.

If you have been hacked:

• Don’t blame yourself – it can happen to anyone. It’s important that you tell a trusted adult what’s happening so they can support you.
• Get in touch with the company (e.g. Instagram, TikTok) who control the account. Tell them you have been hacked and have lost control of your account.
• Change the passwords of any other accounts you have which might use the same one as the hacked account, to avoid the scammers gaining control of them too.

3. Phishing

Phishing scams usually come in the form of a message, like an email, DM or a text. These messages come from scammers who want to get you to type in your personal information like email addresses and login passwords. They do it so they can then use it to scam you or they sell your information to someone who will.

Phishing messages will usually contain a few key things which can help you spot them:

• A link for you to click on, which might be suspicious because it is unfamiliar or misspelled.

• A prize to be claimed, ‘you’ve won a new iPhone!’, or a threat which suggests you need to take action quickly before something bad happens ‘log in now or your videos will be deleted!’

• Requests for information like login details, email addresses, your date of birth, address or phone number, which impersonate (are pretending to come from) a company or organisation you’re familiar with.

How to stay safe from phishing attacks:

• Never click on links in emails, direct messages or texts which you aren’t expecting.

• Scammers don’t just use them for phishing, there is also a chance that by clicking you’ll end up with viruses or malware (computer software designed to do harm) which can damage your computer or phone.

• Always be suspicious of what you see online, whether it’s in your email inbox, your DMs or sent to you publicly. Even if it might seem to be harmless it’s better to be safe than sorry.

• If you aren’t sure if a message is a phishing attempt, ask a responsible adult like a parent or guardian.

Ways to stay safe

It’s important to have some tools you can use to spot scams – because they come in all shapes and sizes. There's more information on the different types of scams out there on the . Being scammed can be really upsetting, but it’s important to understand that it can happen to anyone and there are plenty of things you can do to protect yourself. Here’s a reminder of some of them:

• Anything you aren’t expecting – whether it’s a DM, phone call, email, text or notification online – should be viewed with caution until you’re sure it’s safe. If you’re not sure, always ask your parent, guardian or other trusted adult for a second opinion.

• Age restrictions are there for a reason – check the restriction on any social media, gaming or other platform before you sign up and make sure it’s appropriate for your age.

• Always set strong passwords.

• Make sure you have ‘two factor authentication’ set up on your social media and other accounts.

• Keep your profile set to private and don’t accept friend or message requests from anyone you don’t know.

• If you do get a message from someone you don’t know, make sure you let a parent, carer or other trusted adult know.

• Block and delete anyone that makes you feel uncomfortable in any way. You can also report users and the social media or gaming platform you’re using should have advice on how to do this.

• Learn to verify messages you receive. You can check if an email really comes from the organisation or person it claims by tapping or clicking on the sender’s name. If it comes from an organisation, it should have the organisation’s real web address in the second part after the @ e.g. firstname.surname@bbc.com

• Learn the warning signs that feature in many scams. Are you being made to feel under pressure by the person? Are they asking you to do something unusual, like sending money? If the answer is yes, make sure you let a trusted adult know.

• Never meet someone IRL you’ve only met online.

Talk about scams

Dr Alison Attrill-Smith is a cyberpsychologist who specialises in scams at the University of Birmingham. ‘If you are scammed,’ she says, ‘it isn’t because you’re bad or didn’t pay attention.’ It’s quite normal to feel silly, embarrassed, or even ashamed when we believe we have been scammed.

According to Dr Alison, ‘Being scared to tell someone about the scam may also make you feel anxious or worried’, but it’s important to tell a trusted adult if you feel you’ve been scammed or that someone has tried to scam you. Remember that scammers want you to feel this way so that you don’t share your experience with anyone else.

‘We can’t make scams go away,’ says Dr Alison, ‘but we can’t fear them. Learning to protect yourself is key.’ By getting to know what the warning signs are and, most importantly, sharing the information we learn, we can all be safe from scammers of all kinds.

If you need support

You should always tell someone about the things you’re worried about. You can tell a friend, parent, guardian, teacher, or another trusted adult. If you're struggling with your mental health, going to your GP can be a good place to start to find help. Your GP can let you know what support is available to you, suggest different types of treatment and offer regular check-ups to see how you’re doing.

If you’re in need of in-the-moment support you can contact , where you can speak to a counsellor. Their lines are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

There are more links to helpful organisations on 91�ȱ� Action Line.