I’ve been seeing an unpleasant scam attack being spread via a friend’s account today: I think from a cloned rather than hacked account, but I can’t be sure.

1. If you see a link to an article that apparently describes how Elon Musk is going to make UK residents rich… well, I doubt if anyone really believes in Musk’s charitable impulses, but I’d suggest you resist the temptation to click on it to see where it goes.

2. If you realize your account is being misused and use the words ‘hack’ or ‘hacked’ in a post, the chances are that you’ll get a flood of bots advising you to contact a ‘helpful’ person who’ll your account back for you. Obviously, don’t take any notice. (Yes, I know I’m risking such a flood attached to this post, but if I do that will tell me something useful about my current settings.)

3. The attack is slightly different to what I’ve seen before: the attacker is tagging everyone in my friend’s Friends List and telling them to check a scam link that sooner or later appears in the comments. I’ll be looking into this further. No, not the scam link, the technique.

4. If you set your Friends List so that only you can see it, it makes this sort of attack significantly less effective.