If you’ve ever come across the news last weekend that Friendster is back, we hate to break the news to you: it’s a phishing scam.
A post by a Facebook page claiming that the once-massively popular pre-Facebook social media website has made a comeback made the rounds online, reaching over 9,500 shares. The post remains up as of writing.
Yet the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) has refuted this and warned that the website is home to an IP address that has had previous reports on phishing and other cyber attacks.
“Beware of possible Friendster phishing site,” the DICT announced in a social media post, adding that its computer emergency response team had investigated the website after the announcement of its revival went viral.
“Stunner, a page from Facebook, posted about Friendster being back on social media. Thousands of people have already signed up for the ‘new’ Friendster. However, CERT-PH has assessed that the said website is possibly used for phishing,” it wrote.
“The “new” Friendster appears to be a legitimate website but upon initial investigation, the current IP address hosting the website (23.106.120.84) had previous reports about phishing, brute force and DDoS attacks, hacking, and host exploitations,” it added.
The DICT also pointed out that the website did not include an About Us page which would give more information about the developers, and that it used WordPress for its main service, “which is not used for social networking platforms since it is a content management system.”
The information bureau warned users not to sign up for the website and not to click on any suspicious links to avoid potential cyber threats.
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