YouTube channels ‘converted’ to promote scams and miracle cures

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Google’s platform allows content to stay live and still be featured in ads. Experts point to the actions of scammers to manipulate victims into falling into fraud. Verified and with 645,000 subscribers, the funk channel on YouTube “Metralha dos Fluxos” no longer publishes music videos. In the last month, the videos posted promote easy money, such as the scam with the name of Shein, or a medicine with miraculous promises of enlarging the penis and solving sexual dysfunctions. The videos, recorded by anonymous people, follow a very similar script: they start out as if they were evaluations by customers who have tested the services, but they serve only as advertisements and lead to sites full of signs of fraud. The people who take control of the channels and those who record these videos can be framed in the crime of embezzlement, according to Matheus Falivene, PhD in Criminal Law from the University of São Paulo (USP). This is because they can deceive people, who will spend their money for false promises (see below the reports of those who suffered from the scams). According to experts interviewed by g1, the case of the funk channel shows one of the scammers’ strategies: “converting” relevant channels to publish videos that manipulate new victims. The report found another 27 channels like “Metralha dos Fluxos”, which deviate from their proposal (music or football) to publish videos promoting fraud. Of all these profiles, YouTube removed only one, as it saw a violation of its guidelines. Another 27, including “Metralha dos Fluxos”, add up to 12 million subscribers and are still on the air with fraud advertisements. This report will show you: how the channels are “kidnapped”; the size of the practice; the handling strategy; the reports of victims; the structure behind the coup; how YouTube contradicts itself when moderating videos. The ‘hijacked’ channels to defend financial promises and miracle drugs; PHOTOS How the channels are ‘hijacked’ Kaspersky Lab’s head of security, Fabio Assolini, cites three scammers’ strategies to take control of the channel: criminals hack the channel, change the password and no longer allow the original owners to resume the page; The page is sold, a practice that does not violate YouTube’s guidelines; There is also the possibility that the owner of the profile decides to promote this content. Reached channels have large amounts of subscribers and are sometimes even verified, which gives videos more reach. ” They [golpistas] they are insistent: if the page goes down, they put another one, if the video is taken down, they put another one. If 10 people fall for the scam, he will already be in profit, because there is no real product”, says Assolini. “It’s for people who do a search, see these analyzes and say: ‘this really works.” The size of the practice g1 analyzed 50 videos from pages with hundreds of thousands of followers that started to promote fraud with videos recorded by people who would have adhered to the services. These 50 publications total 255,000 views in 28 channels that, together, have 11 million subscribers. The report separated videos promoting two frauds to analyze: the sites and apps of “Avaliador de Marcas” or Money Looks”, which claim to pay users for evaluating Shein’s clothes, a practice denied by the store itself; the miracle drug “Testo Caps”, also called “Testo Power Caps” or “Testo + Caps”: which promises to eliminate sex and even enlarge the penis, something that is only possible through surgery. In the “converted” channels, there is a series of contents that promote other services with promises of easy money and signs of fraud, such as: “InstaMoney” (compensation for liking publications); “TikTok Pay” (compensation for watching videos); “Velho Rico” (remuneration for conversations with older people); “Opinião Certa” (remuneration for giving opinions on company websites); “Razagan” (promises to increase the size of the penis, delay ejaculation and “total control of erections)”; “Hidrozon” (promises to rid the skin of spots and wrinkles). These videos did not enter the account of the report, because there would be hundreds of publications more in the analysis. Manipulation strategy The videos follow a pattern: anonymous people record their own faces in a video that aims to assess the quality of the service; youtubers even ask to be careful with “fake sites” of the service, which would be responsible for people falling into scams; however, in the course of the video, the person promotes the service: he says that he managed to earn money, in the case of the “Brand Evaluator”, or he talks about the alleged benefits to male sexual health of the drug “Testo Caps”; the description of the video shows the supposed “official sites”: addresses filled with evidence of fraud; the same person can appear on multiple channels, recording more than one video to promote the same service; Videos only receive positive comments, which, according to experts, are written through accounts hacked or automated by scammers. The report was unable to identify the people recording the videos, so the faces were blurred. It was also not possible to contact the channels that were demonstrated in the images above, including the “Metralha dos flows”. ALSO READ: ‘Brand Evaluator’: scam with Shein’s name attracts victims via YouTube, Google and apps Brand denounced for scam with Shein’s name makes new victims in application several reports of people who fell for the blows. As, for example, in the “Complain Here” website tab about “Testo Power Caps”: “the product does NOT work and worse, it caused me health problems”; “the product does not fulfill what it promises, harming the consumer. I know that I am already at a loss and I will continue like this”; “Until now I have not received the product”. The “Brand Evaluator” tab on the site has similar reports: “You will always have to pay to have access and pay to always be able to evaluate. Deceit, making people lose the money they no longer have”; “I invested and bought all the products and received nothing in return, I can barely get into the app, it’s pure trickery”. The structure behind the scams In addition to the videos kept on air on YouTube, the services are supported by payment processing companies. The Shein-named scam, for example, often uses the services of Perfect Pay to process payments from people who believe they will earn money appraising clothes. Registro.br, which administers website domains ending in “.br”, points out that the owner of the Perfect Pay website is Leonardo Rosa Zanette. The g1 contacted him at the email indicated by Registro.br, but, until the last update of this report, there was no response. The report also sought out the company, which stated, in an automated message, that it did not sell any product and was just an intermediary to process payments. Specialist in digital security, software engineer Vinícius Gallafrio explains that these videos can also be boosted by the so-called “PLR” market, in which people resell digital products that belong to third parties. “These products are not always proven effective. In practice, a person advertises slimming capsules and earns a commission on top of the sale.” Therefore, a practice that may exist in the market is to buy testimonials for the sales pages, says Gallafrio. “In sales of these ‘infoproducts’, to pass on more credibility, social evidence is inserted, where people attest to having used the product and obtained phenomenal results”, he explains. What YouTube says Through its advisory, YouTube said that only one of the 50 videos uploaded by the report was removed, along with the channel that hosted it, for violating the platform’s policies against spam, misleading practices and scams. Several of the publications kept online, however, promote the same scam as the removed video: the “Brand Evaluator” application. In addition, the platform itself discloses, on its website, that the “Community Guidelines” do not allow videos with exaggerated promises such as “claiming that viewers can get rich quickly” or a miracle treatment that “can cure chronic diseases such as cancer” . However, the platform advisory completed its statement by stating that YouTube content “must follow our Community Guidelines” and that it relies on a combination of intelligent systems, human reviewers and user reports to identify material.

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