Suddenly I’ve had dozens of spam accounts adding me by phone number on LINE. They all have nonsense names of random numbers and letters, and they all keep trying to add me to group chats where a bunch of accounts keep posting (in Japanese) about how investing in whatever scam they’re trying to trick me into signing up for is great.
I always block and report all these suspicious accounts but it’s getting annoying.
Is there a way to make it where only people who are mutual friends can add you to a group chat, or a good way to shut down this spam for good? I’m guessing that my phone number wound up on some list of numbers online somewhere, or they’re just guessing random Japanese phone numbers and adding every one that sticks.
8 comments
https://www.reddit.com/r/japanlife/comments/xx0vbn/im_getting_spam_invited_to_suspicious_line_groups/
I’ve been added to some of these groups recently. So far, they are all investment scams.
Usually, I mute the group, wait a couple of hours for the regular people to leave, then post a message “投資詐欺のグループです！”. That warns other potential victims. They usually kick me from the group pretty quickly after doing that.
Nope, I guess I’m not popular enough…
They seem to love me on YouTube though. Every person I’m subscribed to suddenly really wants me to message them on something called Telegram.
Don’t interact, block, and report if you can, regardless of service.
On a lighter note, is LINE spam replacing the daily what’s up with masks thread now?
Yeah, I’ve been getting them a lot more lately. I figure my number must have got out in a data breach somewhere. Annoying but nothing to do other than change my group chat settings and block them.
Same. I just leave a “Die” message and leave, report, block.
You can prevent people from adding you by phone number.
Yup. Strange line groups