Beware of Fake Camaro Giveaways on Facebook

A trend on Facebook is the creation of pages which claim to be giving away large prizes, such as a Chevrolet Camaro. Unfortunately, however, these pages and giveaways are usually fake. Today we’ll take a closer look at bogus Camaro giveaway pages on Facebook.

Below is a screen shot of one of these phony Camaro giveaways:

After monitoring several of these phony giveaway pages, we have noted that they generally share the following characteristics:

• The page was only created about 24 to 72 hours ago
• Only one or two posts
• After several thousand likes, the page disappears
• No winners are ever announced
• The pages do not identify themselves in any way

Below is a post by a phony Camaro giveaway page seen on October 22, 2013:

The wording of the post above reads:

For the first time ever in facebook history we are giving away a 2013 Chevrolet Camaro to one winner that we will select on October 25th completely at random.

Would you like to join this amazing giveaway for a chance to own a brand new Camaro ? Simply follow the following steps to enter the competition :

1) Step 1 – Like our Fanpage

2) Step 2 – Share this photo

3) Step 3 – Comment below your desired color: blue,yellow or red

Good Luck everyone!

Edited Posts

After checking back to view the above post, we noticed it had been edited 8 times, with the giveaway date changing several times.

Violation of Facebook Terms

While many legitimate companies offer promotions via Facebook, the fake Camaro giveaways violate section E of Facebook’s Page Guidelines, which state a page must post official rules, terms and eligibility, and acknowledgement that it is not associated with Facebook. Requiring users to share a photo or status is also a violation of these guidelines.

Why do it?

The biggest question is why someone would bother running a fake promotion, especially if they aren’t linking to a website of any kind. From our research, we have found that the most likely reason such fake promotions are created is to simply build up a Facebook page with massive amounts of likes. These pages are then sold, renamed, and all traces of their fake promotions are deleted. This activity is sometimes referred to as “like farming.”

What you can do

If you see one of these fake Camaro promotions on Facebook, you can report the page or the post as spam/scam. You can also drop a link to this article in the comments.

2014 Variant

Below is a screenshot of a fake Camaro giveaway on Facebook spotted in January 2014. For the cover photo, they took the graphic for a contest called “Hot Wheels For Real.” That contest could be found mentioned in the New York Times, but was not associated with the fake Camaro giveaway page.

Also in 2014 we saw similar fake BMW giveaways on the rise. See our full discussion of those fake giveaways here. In August 2014 we noticed another surge in fake Camaro giveaways on Facebook.

Bottom Line

Fake Camaro giveaways are increasing on Facebook. Liking or sharing these pages and posts will only create more spam and phony giveaways.