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In May 2018, social media users began reporting a new Target gift card scam in the form of a viral message that typically read something along the lines of Text TARGET to 83361 and claim a free Target gift card: On Facebook, these messages follow a formula: a greeting followed by the text scam and a smiling emoji. This suggests the involvement of bots, and that some users' Facebook accounts may have compromised. At least one person whose account posted a similar gift card scam subsequently said that the message was posted without their knowledge to every Facebook group of which they were a member: As noted by sites such as IDTheftInfo.org, such messages are a form of smishing scam: Almost all the Facebook posts we found came with photographs of food to give a false impression that the gift card has allowed its recipients to splash out on a bounty of Target products. In reality, we were able to confirm that many of these images are taken from other sources — some from years ago — and used to add credibility to the scam. This particular scam is similar to previous insidious hoaxes relating to free gift cards from Walmart and other retailers. On its web site, Walmart offered this advice to anyone who receives suspicious or unsolicited communications: A spokesperson for Walmart confirmed by telephone that the previous similar 83361 gift card offer was a scam and not legitimate.
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