Grindr users are absolutely furious after discovering that the hot guys who they thought were real were actually spambots infecting their phones with sext-ually transmitted diseases.
Several men have reported falling victim to the spambots, which have been preying on users in the U.K. The bots are designed to strike up a conversation. Once they’ve engaged a user by talking about their “really nice dicks,” they try to lure them into clicking on a link to a fake webcam site, which then installs a virus on their device.
“It’s not a natural conversation flow,” one of the victims tells Pink News. “So it seems suspicious, but equally convincing enough to be real.”
Related: Grindr Wants Your Email Address To Ward Off Spambots And Other Headless Torsos
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Some tell-tale indicators of a spambot are their unusually short height, typically less than three feet, and their inability to carry on a sophisticated conversation. For example, one man tried telling a bot his penis had fallen off, and it responded, “Sweet.”
Here’s a screen shot from that conversation:
A spokesperson for Grindr told PinkNews that the website is “definitely aware of spambot activity” and assured they are working on making security improvements.
“At the end of the day,” the spokesperson said, “education and information remain an important defense against spambots–and Grindr notifies our users with broadcast messages on this topic while actively discouraging users from clicking on spam profiles and links.”
Related: The Dallas Grindr Scammer Will Break Your Heart And Your Bank Account
Benjamin Tarsa
I make any suspiciously cute guys solve math problems before I’ll chat with them
Anthony Edward Rosener III
You have to be a real idiot to fall for these bots.
Edwin Hernandez Alcala
Jamie Sandoval watch out !
Victor Barry
Yep, I’ve gotten this a few times.
Brad Oleson
When you block the spam, the act of blocking the profile launches an advertisement. So, technically, Grindr may NOT want to fully stop them because they present unique opportunities to present an ad to a user, and sometimes one they have to pay attention to for a portion of the ad to dismiss it (typically 5 or so seconds).
I find the proliferation of spam-bots on Grindr highly suspect!
But yeah, if you actually gave the bot your number…well, maybe analog dating is more your speed?
Dean Long
They are all.like 2’4″ tall lol
Malibu Eric
@Benjamin Tarsa: That’s a good one, I’ll definitely borrow your tactic 🙂
Matthew James
Juan San Juan
Chris
I’ll just uninstall the app if I encounter stuff like that.
Stache99
@Benjamin Tarsa: Well, just don’t make the math too hard. You might not know the difference.
BlogShag
People who fall for their scams are just plain stupid. You can spot them a mile away, or in their case, 8,000 miles away…LOL. And what normal conversation rushes and harasses you to look at their website? It’s stupid and annoying.
Spambots are why I will never buy a paid membership.
DannX68
I get suspicious when some guy writes “hey” or “what’s up dude” or something and it says it was sent maybe 4 hours ago, but when you look at his profile he hasn’t been online for 5 days. I get a lot of those.
silveroracle
I’m sick of spam bots on Grindr. It’s really pissing me off. So much to the fact that I feel like deleting the app and not going back on and advising other people to do so.
If I get any more of the spam bots I am going to notify Grindr that that is what I shall do.
Maybe then they will sit up and take notice.
Mykaels
It’s why I quit grindr.