Beware! WhatsApp video call scam making the rounds
THE STAR
Scam site: Clicking on an invite to join "video calling" on WhatsApp will lead to a scam site that asks you to install malware.
Popular messaging service WhatsApp has been rolling out a video-calling service in stages to users on both iOS and Android platforms.
While it looks like iOS users already have the update, the video calling option hasn’t appeared for some Android users yet.
However, while users await the update that will enable video calling, it seems that some scammers have already come up with a new way to have users install malware on their machines.
The scam works by sending you an invite that reads something like, “You’re invited to try Whatsapp Video Calling feature,” and asks you to click on a link to activate it.
This is the pop-up that leads to the scam website.
The link will take you to a very suspicious website with a “whatappvideooline.com” URL (note the mispelling of WhatsApp).
From there, clicking on a link will install the malware on your smartphone which then asks you to send the invite to four more friends, thus spreading the malware to more people.
If you’re waiting for video calling to be enabled on your smartphone, just wait for the official update from Google Play.
The official update page for WhatsApp looks like this. Video calling is only available for Android 4.1 and up.
If you want to manually update in Google Play, just make sure that you’re updating the app from WhatsApp, Inc and not any of the multitude of fake messenger apps out there purporting to be WhatsApp.
For iOS users, making a video call in the updated WhatsApp involves tapping on a video camera icon on the top right of the screen, but for Android users, you might already have the video calling feature but it's not that obvious – tap on the phone icon at the top right hand corner and you will be given the option for voice or video calling.
Scam site: Clicking on an invite to join "video calling" on WhatsApp will lead to a scam site that asks you to install malware.
Popular messaging service WhatsApp has been rolling out a video-calling service in stages to users on both iOS and Android platforms.
While it looks like iOS users already have the update, the video calling option hasn’t appeared for some Android users yet.
However, while users await the update that will enable video calling, it seems that some scammers have already come up with a new way to have users install malware on their machines.
The scam works by sending you an invite that reads something like, “You’re invited to try Whatsapp Video Calling feature,” and asks you to click on a link to activate it.
This is the pop-up that leads to the scam website.
The link will take you to a very suspicious website with a “whatappvideooline.com” URL (note the mispelling of WhatsApp).
From there, clicking on a link will install the malware on your smartphone which then asks you to send the invite to four more friends, thus spreading the malware to more people.
If you’re waiting for video calling to be enabled on your smartphone, just wait for the official update from Google Play.
The official update page for WhatsApp looks like this. Video calling is only available for Android 4.1 and up.
If you want to manually update in Google Play, just make sure that you’re updating the app from WhatsApp, Inc and not any of the multitude of fake messenger apps out there purporting to be WhatsApp.
For iOS users, making a video call in the updated WhatsApp involves tapping on a video camera icon on the top right of the screen, but for Android users, you might already have the video calling feature but it's not that obvious – tap on the phone icon at the top right hand corner and you will be given the option for voice or video calling.
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