A few months ago, I fielded several emails and callers from people worried that a Westfield Win A Gift Card promotion on facebook was a scam.

Cynical marketing ploy? Yes

Shameless attempt to cash in social networking? Of course

Do I like asking questions and then answering them? Certainly.

Scam? No.

It was a genuine marketing promotion.

Over the past few days, 40,000 facebook users have fallen victim to an Ikea Gift Card Scam. And this time, it really is a scam.

Step 1) You are asked to join a facebook fan group allowing you to Win a $1000 Ikea gift card. The design is flashy and professional.

A few commentators have jumped on the fear mongering band wagon (In my mind, the fear mongering band wagon is a black panel van with flames on the side and a skull on the bonnet) claiming that the anyone who signed on will end up the identity theft.

However, I’m not sure this is case.

If you put the pieces together (which come conveniently flat packed with allen key included) it becomes clear that the creator of the group mostly receives kick backs from the companies above for signing on new recruits.

These types of affiliate programs are all over the net and they are not illegal.

What is illegal, however, is to promise a gift voucher that you don’t deliver.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 13th, 2010 at 10:44 am and is filed under Internet. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

“Ikea Facebook Gift Card Scam”

1. On April 19th, 2010 at 8:41 am Ellie Won Says:

   Actually, it does appear to have been some sort of attempt at identity theft. I hate to admit it but myself and a number of people on my friends list fell for this scam - and the next time we logged in, we had facebook security alerts saying that there had been attempts to log into our accounts from unusual locations - mine was Nicaragua.