WhatsApp has over two billion users, making it one of the world’s most popular instant messaging apps. Given its popularity, it’s no surprise that some are trying to exploit it to try to steal your personal and financial data.
Scammers operating through the messaging app contact people through texts or phone calls, often impersonating legitimate entities. They sometimes also demand money with threats of harming a loved one.
WhatsApp scams are constantly evolving, making some of them hard to spot. However, there are some ways you can identify the most common red flags.
Read on for our guide to WhatsApp scams and how to avoid them.
What is WhatsApp?
WhatsApp allows users to send texts and voice recordings, make video and voice calls, share documents and more.
Perhaps one of WhatsApp’s most attractive features is that it uses end-to-end encryption. With this secure messaging method, only the sender and receiver can read sent messages. In fact, when you open up a new chat on WhatsApp, a notification states that no one outside of that chat, not even Whatsapp, can read or listen to anything shared.
The app also lets you create encrypted backups of your chats. This allows you to save a copy of your conversations to iCloud or Google Drive that can only be accessed with a password or an encryption…
