A Queensland woman has revealed the moment she realised she had made a horrible mistake that saw her and her followers lose thousands.
A Queensland influencer has been left reeling after overseas hackers took control of her social media accounts, tricked her followers into giving away thousands of dollars and then demanded ransom money to return the login details to her.
Bec McMillan, 43, a single mum-of-two from the Gold Coast, makes a living from her Instagram pages as a public figure.
With several accounts impersonating her, the mum was looking to get verified on Instagram — meaning a blue tick would appear next to her name — to legitimise her online presence.
Four weeks ago, in early December, she discovered a company that promised to get people the blue tick. It seemed to be legitimate.
But she was confused when, after handing over her login details, instead of a blue tick, the profile pictures changed and advertisements for obscure cryptocurrencies popped up on her Instagram stories.
Growing alarmed, she tried to log into two of her accounts but the passwords had changed and she was locked out.
“I’m devastated,” Ms McMillan told news.com.au. “This has cost me a lot, I’ve built my career on social media.”
Then she received a text message from the scammers which confirmed her worst fears.
The hacker sent a ransom note that promised to give her accounts back in exchange for money.
Ms McMillan made it clear that she wouldn’t be paying them a cent but the hacker was persistent.
“Make the payments as you are requested and I promise you get your account instantly,” one message read.
This prompted Ms McMillan to threaten him with police intervention and the hacker calmly replied: “Alright, hit me up once you’re ready to get your account back, thanks.”
Other texts included “Hello Ma’am, you’re wasting time, we need to get this done once and all” and sending her his PayPal information as well as asking for a screenshot of the ransom payment.
Another hacker even sent messages to Ms McMillan’s sister demanding payment, but their tone became aggressive.
Her sister said she had contacted PayPal authorities and the hacker called her an “idiot” and goaded her with “Alright do that fool”.
Because Ms McMillan refused to pay up, her accounts have remained in the hands of the hackers.
In the past four weeks, “they’ve already done so much damage in that time,” she said.
The hackers took control of two of her accounts — one with 11,500 followers and the other with 4,500 followers.
The first thing they did was private message all those followers using what Ms McMillan suspects was a bot.
“They messaged thousands of people at once, saying I’d reached my limit on my bank account, asking for $350 and saying they would pay it straight back,” she explained.
Unfortunately, some of her fans fell for it.
It then got worse. The hackers changed her profile picture and bio to promote their own cryptocurrency scams promising profits were guaranteed.
“Because I am an entrepreneur people believe me I’m going to make them money,” she said. “People think it’s still me on the account.”
In the worst case she’s heard of, one of her avid followers who she has known for years gave away $2000 to the scammers.
Unfortunately, this person was a single mum and that was all her savings.
“I’ve been telling people please don’t give them any money,” Ms McMillan said.
“Now all these beautiful people [are] getting ripped off, my name going is down in the mud.
“I’m losing followers obviously, some people think I’m just dodgy.”
Ms McMillan has been contacting Instagram since she lost control for her accounts, trying to get them to act.
To maintain control, the hackers have been changing the account handles and have blocked her.
She has been fighting with Facebook, which owns Instagram, to prove that the accounts have been compromised.
“You follow the prompts of where to go for help, you’re pulling your hair out, going around in circles,” she recalled.
She says she’s emailed Facebook 30 times with no reply.
News.com.au flagged the issue with Facebook and an investigation is under way and a spokesperson admitted the two accounts “both look compromised”.
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