Telegram scammers targeting users with malware

[God Of Thunder]

If you connect your wallet, I am not sure maybe you will still be the one that will make payment into the scammers address, but I do not think so because victims complained that all the money on their wallet are stolen with the Telegram scam.

So I do not know if this malware is truly new or not, but it is worth knowing. Although, it is just like before, if you avoid the fake Telegram groups, you will avoid the malware.

It's not malware. It is a smart contract designed to wipe out the entire wallet to a specific address. But before it happens, the victims must connect the wallet and approve the transaction. I created a thread a couple of months ago. My entire meta mask wallet was drained once I connected my meta mask to a fake airdrop website. It took 30 seconds to wipe out my entire wallet. It was too late when I revoked the connection. These are known as crypto wallet drainers. However, I see many new media and blog articles refer to it as malware.

[GreatArkansas]

Any link sent to you from a stranger should be viewed with distrust. Telegram fraud has become very sophisticated these days.

Links, files like animated images, videos need to be ignored and avoid to download them.

How to disable auto media download in Telegram.

Turning the automatic download feature for your Telegram account, and avoid clicking on any unsolicited links and files.

I thought the Telegram media auto downloads only for images/video files. So let's say even any files that auto-downloaded by telegram, are safe since they are media files (video or image) and that is impossible file could be infected by any malware?? I'm not sure.

Once in the Telegram group, users are immediately prompted to verify through OfficiaISafeguardBot. This fake bot creates artificial urgency with extremely short verification windows. The verification process secretly injects malicious PowerShell code into your clipboard. When executed, it downloads and runs malware that can compromise your system and crypto wallets.

Scary ASF!!!!!!

I believe there's a file that user downloaded if this kind of malware was able to went inside to your system.

[jcojci]

This is what a scammer will do to their victim. They will try to convince their victim by offering a tempting offer and asking you to join. If you are not careful, you will follow what they want that making you lose.

If a stranger gives you a link and asks you to check it, you can skip that and block him immediately. That can be a way for them to starts scamming you without you realizing. That is most common ways that scammers do it so you needs to be careful with this.

No need to bother with a stranger that you really don't know. You must be responsible with yourself and aware of any link, document, file, or anything that stranger give to you and no need to clicks that.

[Patikno]

Any link sent to you from a stranger should be viewed with distrust. Telegram fraud has become very sophisticated these days. In my country, they spread a message like, "Look, you're on the news," or ask, "Is that you in the photo?" and send a file with the extension ... apk. After you click on the link, all your funds are debited from your cards if they are linked to your phone. The same thing happens with the distribution of fake links from our Telegram crypto groups that we subscribe to receive news. We don't know the people who sent the links, and we shouldn't trust them. But there is another thing: scammers have learned to hack Telegram accounts. Even after receiving a link from people you know, still be extremely careful. Sometimes bad things can be sent from acquaintances.

More than that, not only we have to be careful and distrust any link that was sent to us from strangers, we also have to be careful that any link that sent to us even from our colleagues, they might have became a victim to scam and the scammer is operating their account and sent a link to their associate contacts. We could as well ask questioned them about the link, in case its a phising and they think that was a valid link, such us a website for gifts or discounts which asked them to share the link, since not everyone is aware of internet scamming.

[PX-Z]

Something similar once happened with one of my friends. He rarely used his TG account and and one day some Russian guy somehow hacked his account. All of his personal details were private, numbers and everything and he had 2fa on. But still the hacker was able to got hold of his account. Later we (I was with him) tried to recover the account, but the recovery code wasn't coming. And at the same time the hacker was threatening us by saying he would hack all our accounts. He used all kinds of slang vulgar words like asshole,mother****. Unfortunately we couldn't recover it. We had to abandon that account though it didn't contain much information or anything.

Good thing i was awake when this happened so i did all stuff to prevent the hack, but i guess since i owned the tg number i can still recover the account, No? Why its not possible to your friend? Well, it doesn't happened to me yet. But why it's not possible, uhm, i guess maybe if mobile number is changed.

[DYING_S0UL]

-snip-

Good thing i was awake when this happened so i did all stuff to prevent the hack, but i guess since i owned the tg number i can still recover the account, No? Why its not possible to your friend? Well, it doesn't happened to me yet. But why it's not possible, uhm, i guess maybe if mobile number is changed.

I vaguely remember that incident, it's been more than a year. All I can recall was that we were trying to recover the account but were unable to do so. The logging code wasn't coming through, and the system gave us a message, "too many attempts" or something similar. I guess the hacker first hacked the account with malware and then bruteforced it in order to lock us out! We were unsuccessful that day. I can't tell whether he (friend) was able to recover that later.

[SamReomo]

Telegram is full of scammers and frauds, they actually know that most users who use Telegram are somehow part of crypto community and especially the ones who've joined some crypto call groups.

The scammers first introduce themselves as insiders and sometimes they show huge balance of their accounts to gain trust of the victims. In actual they don't have any such balance but only they show it via screenshot, and that's their way to trap victims.

Only awareness can prevent the community from such scams, and the scammers will always try to find ways to scam others. They have no moral values and they don't really care about someone else. Only education and awareness is our weapon against such scammers.

[Smartvirus]

Good thing i was awake when this happened so i did all stuff to prevent the hack, but i guess since i owned the tg number i can still recover the account, No? Why its not possible to your friend? Well, it doesn't happened to me yet. But why it's not possible, uhm, i guess maybe if mobile number is changed.

It’s the one way in which you can’t have access to a telegram channel no more. Not having access to the telegram phone number which could have been reset to a whole new one. Once that is done, then it’s gone to you too and that’s a whole lot of hack to reverse. Do they even do that?
Telegram have never been an easy catch or deal for users. You’ve got to be very skeptical about whatever text you receive and how to go about it. Being vigilant on those pop up notifications and proactive to tackle the security warnings when they pop up.

[Zoomic]

If I get sent a link from someone I don't know or get an unsolicited offer from someone I am not expecting and I still go ahead to give this person the attention he is seeking for, even to the extent of giving him some private information I should be keeping to myself, then I should really be taking responsibility for my stupidity if anything eventually goes wrong. Some people are just too careless and only get to realise how careless they were after some damage have already been done.

Scammers are becoming more sophisticated these days and the only only way we can stay ahead of them is by avoiding strangers and strange links completely. If everyone can do this, the risks of getting scammed will reduce a bit. That is until these scammers device new means of scamming their victims effortlessly.

[Hamza2424]

Yup, there are many DM's if we join some hot groups, sometimes they use the name of platform support or core team member for kind of assistance and their other cruel methods (Cruel in terms of shity methods).

Honestly, we all know about the market and spammers and some other basic precautions we need to take, except for some of those who are opening their eyes recently in crypto industry.

I've found something stage, haha I know there's nothing strange in it but I've come to know this recently, Haha I was checking the source of the mode WhatsApp which is super famous all around my region Watsapp GB after watching a video that it contains some fishy access permissions haha and it there I've checked myself there are some crypto-related scripts and many payment permissions in simple words all possible access our smartphone can provide were there.

So My dear Watsapp GB users if you want read the deleted messages only you can go for notification data reading better than Watsapp GB.

[Wonder Work]

This is what a scammer will do to their victim. They will try to convince their victim by offering a tempting offer and asking you to join. If you are not careful, you will follow what they want that making you lose.

If a stranger gives you a link and asks you to check it, you can skip that and block him immediately. That can be a way for them to starts scamming you without you realizing. That is most common ways that scammers do it so you needs to be careful with this.

No need to bother with a stranger that you really don't know. You must be responsible with yourself and aware of any link, document, file, or anything that stranger give to you and no need to clicks that.

I also had such a problem once while learning about new crypto. First, I tried different types of airdrops and got a payment of about $30 at a time. Later, I kept it in one of my trust wallets. One day, a message came to my Telegram, and I was surprised. Later, while chatting with them, they gave me a requirement that you can earn a lot of money from there. Although I was new then, I did not understand, so I asked them to share my wallet phrase. I shared it. Later, after a few days, I saw my wallet empty. That's when I realized that they were scamming me. Then I blocked them, stopped using that wallet, and started using another.

There are many messages on Telegram to scan constantly. It is better to avoid these messages now, and I also avoid them because they are sitting in their hands. If you fall into their trap, you will lose. That is why we must proceed very carefully so that they cannot harm us and we do not fall into a trap.

[Aanuoluwatofunmi]

I have joined some Telegram groups before. When you joined or if you post on the group, you will see some scammers that will send you message to chat with you. Convincing you that they are working in group and the project. But they are all scammers.

If we can maintain an healthy practice on the use of the so called social media telegram app, then we are not likely going to to be a victim for related scam there, here are some tips we may have to follow to ensure that we make use of the opportunity on the use of social media and telegram precisely in a safety mode.

1. Don't join any group you don't know about
2. Ensure to activate 2FA on your telegram
3.  Avoid telegram links unsolicited
4. Same as well, you need to avoid downloads there
5. Don't make your contact number or email visible to the public on telegram

With these few steps, you are not going to easily be attracted to any scam related telegram attempts others are being affected of.

[Peanutswar]

Golden rule in telegram if you dont know the person or someone talking to you he is a scammer until otherwise rproven legit user from a project. I often got dm with such introductions and ofcourse these scammers even use legit or verified users. I have not yet fallen into the likes of these modus since I am not gonne be swayed by such offer even though its so good.

Actually not even in telegram but any kind of socials and even it came on your friends randomly because sometimes their account are the one got compromised and because you are having often conversation with them you forgot to make yourself keep more safety. Tons of people now are getting careless recently on the internet so stay vigilant. In telegram before you can filtered out people who can message to you but now you need become their premium member to access this feature.

[Asuspawer09]

I've got some kind of malware, and almost got my email hacked on twitter/X last time searching for some new cryptocurrency projects, so probably just be careful especially on linked that is being sent on different groups, especially on Telegram where a lot of scammers are using, There was no way around it for sure, so if there are a lot of red flags and some shady things going on, Im not going to join a group on telegram.

Any link sent to you from a stranger should be viewed with distrust. Telegram fraud has become very sophisticated these days. In my country, they spread a message like, "Look, you're on the news," or ask, "Is that you in the photo?" and send a file with the extension ... apk. After you click on the link, all your funds are debited from your cards if they are linked to your phone. The same thing happens with the distribution of fake links from our Telegram crypto groups that we subscribe to receive news. We don't know the people who sent the links, and we shouldn't trust them. But there is another thing: scammers have learned to hack Telegram accounts. Even after receiving a link from people you know, still be extremely careful. Sometimes bad things can be sent from acquaintances.

More than that, not only we have to be careful and distrust any link that was sent to us from strangers, we also have to be careful that any link that sent to us even from our colleagues, they might have became a victim to scam and the scammer is operating their account and sent a link to their associate contacts. We could as well ask questioned them about the link, in case its a phising and they think that was a valid link, such us a website for gifts or discounts which asked them to share the link, since not everyone is aware of internet scamming.

I believed that it is not really going to be easy to be hack, like if you click a link your not really gonna get hack that easily unless you just got trick into putting your information to a fake website something like that, its a different case if the telegram is the one getting hack, in this case its probably better to avoid strangers since you can already see that the intention of someone want to have a chat with you is to trick you.

[PX-Z]

.. My entire meta mask wallet was drained once I connected my meta mask to a fake airdrop website. It took 30 seconds to wipe out my entire wallet. It was too late when I revoked the connection. These are known as crypto wallet drainers. However, I see many new media and blog articles refer to it as malware.

Yeah, it should be malicious smart contract or just malicious website. Malware has a different meaning. Regardless the name it will still steal your funds if not carefully secured your device. Btw Sorry for the loss.

[Miles2006]

Honestly, I never bothered to click the link provided for clarification. The information provided is enough and satisfying, this is a clear example how careful we all ought to be, why will anyone fall for a cheap scam like this one involving wallet and private details. I don’t understand the point clearly because I want to know what’s promising about the project, although any user who decides to send message to an unknown group should be ready to handle situations like this definitely the person is now the center of attraction. I’m sure people who send different messages face all sort of temptation and it’s so difficult understanding the genuine ones, personally avoiding such group is the starting point to escape all this.

[Moreno233]

I have joined some Telegram groups before. When you joined or if you post on the group, you will see some scammers that will send you message to chat with you. Convincing you that they are working in group and the project. But they are all scammers. What I noticed before was that they will give you a fake link and tell you to connect your wallet. If you connect your wallet, I am not sure maybe you will still be the one that will make payment into the scammers address, but I do not think so because victims complained that all the money on their wallet are stolen with the Telegram scam.

So I do not know if this malware is truly new or not, but it is worth knowing. Although, it is just like before, if you avoid the fake Telegram groups, you will avoid the malware. Scam Sniffer posted on X that the malware is through a bot. And that it can compromise your crypto wallets and your device.

I don't think it is wise to connect wallet to any platform provided by some random people via dm, that is risky and often end in tears. If you have been active in cryptocurrency, it is not really complicated to know a scammer from the first few words that will come out of him. Whenever I receive a random DM, the first thing that comes to me mind is that I'm being confronted by a scammer. It will take the person convincing me to thin other wise and I will be very attentive to the tone of the conversation as well as the logic so I will be able to spot a red flag which scammers never fail to drop. 

[albon]

I don't think it is wise to connect wallet to any platform provided by some random people via dm, that is risky and often end in tears. If you have been active in cryptocurrency, it is not really complicated to know a scammer from the first few words that will come out of him. Whenever I receive a random DM, the first thing that comes to me mind is that I'm being confronted by a scammer. It will take the person convincing me to thin other wise and I will be very attentive to the tone of the conversation as well as the logic so I will be able to spot a red flag which scammers never fail to drop. 

It's not just the DMs you receive on your Telegram account, but also the accounts they create on the X platform as mentioned in the tweet link shared by the OP.

These fake accounts are similar to the official accounts of influencers with the verification badges and they comment on their tweets with links to these groups that they claim are exclusive, premium or private with the temptations they write to urge beginners to join these groups on Telegram to double their investments or for profit from airdrops and so on. As soon as they rush to join, they will find that their wallets have been compromised if they are not using hardware wallets, and also their systems if this is the primary system they use to store important data when the malware works on their devices. This is indeed an evolution of simple phishing, and everyone should be aware of all these scammers' tactics, to be aware of how to secure themselves.

[God Of Thunder]

Yeah, it should be malicious smart contract or just malicious website. Malware has a different meaning. Regardless the name it will still steal your funds if not carefully secured your device. Btw Sorry for the loss.

Haha. That was expensive for me, but a lesson learned. I used to give advice to people about how phishing works and that they should check the URL twice before they connect their wallet to a website. But my smart ass did not want to follow what I suggested to others, and I went ahead to connect my wallet even though I was sleepy and on my mobile device when I did that.

That was actually stupid of me. But I have learned a lesson. This actually proves that no matter how experienced you are, you could still fall for scams if you become careless while surfing the internet. That happened because I was confident that I won't fall for these scams

[joniboini]

I thought the Telegram media auto downloads only for images/video files. So let's say even any files that auto-downloaded by telegram, are safe since they are media files (video or image) and that is impossible file could be infected by any malware?? I'm not sure.

It's the opposite. You should turn it off to avoid downloading malware embedded in pictures or videos. I saw dozens of news related to malware spreading through Telegram, from fake docx files to PDFs, so Telegram clearly won't protect you from that. Even if you use virustotal or something similar to scan the files there's no guarantee their database is updated to include the latest malware. I believe it's better to assume nothing is immune to malware attacks so you don't get blindsided. CMIIW.