‘I let my guard down’: Scammers targeting small business owners with Instagram takeover trick

Ms Dayana, who works in a pottery studio and conducts workshops, then referred the buyer to her website, asking them to check what was available and complete the purchase there. But the buyer insisted on buying through Instagram.

“I guess she really doesn’t know how to use the computer,” Ms Dayana remembered thinking then, laughing at her own naivete. “I sound so stupid now that I’m recounting it.

“I was honestly trying to close the sale because it’s always exciting when someone wants to buy your stuff,” she added. “But also I wanted to help her; not everyone knows how to use a website.”

Ms Dayana relented, telling the buyer they could send the money to her mobile number. The buyer then asked how much it would cost to deliver to Yishun, so Ms Dayana replied that it was a S$5 delivery fee islandwide.

The buyer’s next question, however, led to the first red flag.

The buyer asked if she was the owner or admin of the potekceramics Instagram page, ostensibly to verify that they were dealing with the business owner. Ms Dayana confirmed that she owned the business.

“She was like, okay, just to make sure, I’ll send in a request to Instagram to send you a message just to check whether you’re the real owner or not. Once you receive the message, can you send me a screenshot? Then I’ll make the PayNow to your number,” she said.

What Ms Dayana did not realise was that the buyer was actually using Instagram’s password reset function to take over her account.

Ms Dayana then got a text message from Facebook with a link to reset her Instagram password. Without “thinking” or scrutinising the message, she took a screenshot of it and forwarded it to the buyer.

“I didn’t look at it carefully. I thought it was just like a message from Facebook to verify that I’m the real owner,” she said, admitting that the official nature of the message threw her off, and that it was so quick and easy to take a screenshot of a message and pass it on.

“I was really clouded by, one, I wanted to close the sale. Secondly, I just thought she was a harmless aunty. I thought she didn’t want to be scammed, and I understood also because I didn’t want to be scammed.

“But in the end, I also got scammed.”

SMALL BUSINESS OWNERS TARGETED

Other small business owners have encountered buyers who try to use this seemingly simple method of taking over an Instagram account.

On Sep 21, the owner of handmade jewellery business Ellaie took to TikTok to recount how she was almost deceived by the same ruse, saying in a video that the buyer who tried it was very “unassuming”.

A Straits Times report on Oct 2 also detailed how a man who sold kueh lapis on Instagram fell victim to the method, losing access to his account and a large number of his 5,000 followers, some of them loyal customers.