If you could give a look at my sponsors. They're worth a look!
This scam has cost channels with millions of subs to delete themselves!
Usually, when I read about people being scammed out of whatever I assume they're not the sharpest pencils in the pencil-box so to speak. This time however, the victims are some of the people that take on scammers head-on or those looking for exploits for a living.
Jim Browning was a victim!
For those who don't know who that is, Jim Browning is a Youtuber that is famous for exposing scammers and hoaxers. If there is anyone on the net I can think of whom i'd never expect to become a victim of a scam, it's got to be him. Nevertheless, he was one of the biggest targets they hit in this scam.
The Spiffing Brit also victim
another unlikely individual to be a victim of a scam is the Spiffing Brit. He's famous for finding loopholes and exploits in basically anything you can think of. From the YouTube algorithm to marketing by Pizza Hut, and from ways to cheat in games to buying a huge chunk of Scotland, The Spiffing brit has done it. Nevertheless, he too was a victim of the scam.
How does the scam work?
This was how it started for Jim Browning:
As you can see, the domain where the mail came from is a genuine google.com domain. Often with emails from scammers, the domain from which it is sent is the giveaway from with scam emails are recognized.
even looking at the SMTP headers the mail is hard to identify as being false:
Another way to identify scam emails is the links you're asked to click. In this scam, though, even that seemed to be legit:
The first hint the victim didn't pick up on though, as everyone can start a Google chat account, is the email address listed in the chat he ended up in after clicking the link in the mail:
The address should have been @youtube or @google .com of course.
During the chat that followed, in perfect English and never giving a hint that something was amiss, he was asked to create a new brand account:
Going through the motions, nothing indicated to the victim he was being set up. He created a new channel, and went on to follow instructions, and only at this point did he get a bit scared:
and so he went back to the chat (remember, with the scammer) and asked if he was sure he'd not lose anything by doing this. The reply:
So because of that, and the ambiguity of the screens and information from youtube he was confident he was moving his content, not deleting it.
And now the part where the scammer got to benefit from the scam, having the old account now deleted and replaced with an empty one. This was the request to click another link:
This is where the victim knew he was being scammed. He was asked to fill out the following form:
If he had filled out this with the correct information, the scammer would have been able to get into the google AdSense account and get at all the revenue of the account!
This was the point that the youtuber began to ask the questions he should've asked from the beginning:
Eventually, the scammer knew he'd been found out, but that still didn't mean he gave up:
But the chat devolved into what could best be described as a recruiting attempt, and some boasting about the scammer's skills. For the youtuber in question though, the bottom line was he was able to get his channel back and didn't lose any of his revenue to the scammer. I've heard other channels haven't been so lucky.
So be warned if you have a youtube channel that's making money!
This goes to show that even the savviest of people can get scammed if the circumstances are right. Hope nobody else here was a victim!
The whole video in which Jim Browning explains the scam from start to finish:
Stay safe and stay happy!
