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Telephone scams seem like a thing of the past, but even the simplest methods can be effective if they have a credible claim. This has been demonstrated by this new scam, which uses the 'reality show' of RTVE Operation Triunfo to capture possible victims.

Week after week, OT 2020 fans vote with their phones, calling or sending SMS, to save their favorite contestants, something that has worked like this since the first edition. All this is legal and numerous protections are taken to prevent data theft.

But there is no control over which telephone lines are used, and those responsible for this new scam take advantage of this: they ask fans of certain contestants, such as Favio, Anne or Bruno (who are nominated this week), to recharge in a prepaid line that, supposedly, will be used to send messages in order to save them.

The producer of OT 2020 has not taken long to sound the alarms and, in a tweet citing one of the messages requested by these donations, ensure that "the type of initiatives requesting mobile recharges can be a hoax" and urges followers of the program not to pay "any amount to anyone or for any concept related to mobile OT or recharges".

The director of Gestmusic has also opted for Twitter, where the program is very commented and followed, to communicate the dangers of this scam: "Attention. This is a scam," he said in a first message. And then he insisted: "The recharge lines I consider to be a scam, I do not doubt that someone does it with good intention, but seeing the volume of telephone voting we receive, I already tell you that there is a cat locked up here."

Phishing is the most common method in telephone scams, as it is attempted through a message or link, steals information or money directly from those who receive them. The sophistication of this scam around Operation Triunfo lies in its simplicity: a recharge is only requested to a telephone line that, on paper, is legal.

Operation Triunfo has since its 2017 edition an official mobile application through which it is possible to cast one vote a day to save one of the contestants, as well as to choose the favorite of the week. However, the main method to save, given that there are no restrictions on the number of votes that can be cast, remains through calls and SMS messages.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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  • Triumph operation
  • OT 2020
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