Author of Elon Musk fan page gains Facebook verification and asks followers for bitcoins

Facebook’s administration verified unofficial page of Elon Musk with about 153,000 followers. Shortly after, the account owner launched a fraudulent Bitcoin giveaway on behalf of the billionaire, reports The Verge.

The page’s author published a post urging readers to transfer $1,000 in Bitcoin to a wallet allegedly belonging to Musk, in exchange for $2,000.

“Everyone asks me for help, and now it’s time to do this. Within a day I will multiply all your funds sent to the BTC wallet below. You will send me $1000, and I will return you $2000,” the message read.

According to this data Blockchain.com, on November 1 the scammer’s wallet received 0.0371 BTC (about $2,350 at the time of writing). Some of it has been withdrawn to other addresses.

The page’s owner positioned it as a fan page for posts from the head of SpaceX and Tesla.

Before the verification badge, the account had only ten posts, most of which were retweets of genuine Elon Musk posts.

According to the account’s history, it was created on July 28, 2019 by a person using the handle Kizito Gavin from Egypt. In 2021 the page owner changed the name six times in succession. The page adopted Elon Musk’s name on October 17.

In the company Meta, which owns Facebook, there was no comment. As of publication, the account was unavailable.

As reported, criminals have frequently used the founder of SpaceX and Tesla’s identity to conduct fake Bitcoin giveaways. In June unknown hackers hijacked a popular YouTube account and, under the guise of a “stream” of launching Falcon 9 rocket and the Crew Dragon spacecraft, collected more than 16 BTC from viewers.

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