The ‘Profile Spy’ app on Facebook saw many curious users fall for the self-perpetuating scam which hit a peak in the summer of last year – Today has seen a similar scam explode on Twitter, with clicks to the fake link reaching over 30,000 in a single day.

Presumably launched by the same scammers behind the Facebook counterpart, the self-tweeting message has taken over thousands of accounts today by promising to show the victim who is viewing their profile in exchange for full access to their account.

Profile Spy appears to post two tweets – one containing a (fictitious) number to indicate how many hits the victim’s profile has received and the second including a link back to itself. The main content of this second message reads “Wow! See who viewed your twitter with Profile Spy” before giving a link (which the Tripbase News team is reluctant to publish here).

As well as spreading throughout the world, the app managed to take over some high profile accounts such as ESPN.

Twitter users are being advised that no app is able to reveal who is viewing a profile, and that giving unrestricted access to such apps is not recommended. If you have fallen foul of the Profile Spy app, the good news is that the solution is straightforward – remove the app’s permission to access your account before deleting the posts in question to prevent others from following the bad link. It is also advisable to change your password after doing the above.

Reported by Sam Doving.

Back to the Tripbase News Homepage