COVID drug trial scam emerges

COVID drug trial scam emerges

With the news of a potential COVID-19 vaccine being possibly on the horizon, scammers have wasted no time in using this news to their advantage. The Better Business Bureau has issued a warning about a new COVID-related scam that could show up on your phone.

According to the BBB, scammers are sending text messages claiming to offer money in exchange for being part of a COVID-19 clinical trial. To be more specific, the text messages are saying that you could make $1200 as a volunteer in a COVID study. The text message then requests that you click on an included link to see if you qualify.

The main goal of the scam is to get you to click on the link included in the text message. A few things could happen if you do click on the link. You could end up with some type of malware infecting your device. This malware could be used to hijack your device in order to read your contacts list so the scammers can find more targets. Malware could also be used to find your personal and financial information that’s kept on your device. The link could also take you to a phony website that requests your personal and financial information to see if you ‘qualify’ for the phony trial. In any case, it could mean identity theft or worse.

Now, there are legitimate clinical trials that you can sign up for and possibly get paid if you qualify. Some of these trials even advertise to find potential applicants. However, what they do not do is send out unsolicited text messages to random people, Usually, these trials are looking for a specific type of person. In many cases, the trials are looking for people who may suffer from a certain illness or condition that’s specific to their trial. They won’t ask for your financial information either. Like many scams, the scammers may try to get you to make a payment first to get into their phony trial.

If you receive one of these text messages, your best course of action is to delete the text and block the number. Even if you text them to stop, the scammers will then know that they found a working number and may target you for future scams.