{"id":14425,"date":"2023-04-13T15:41:13","date_gmt":"2023-04-13T14:41:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/?p=14425"},"modified":"2023-04-13T15:41:15","modified_gmt":"2023-04-13T14:41:15","slug":"hoax-ecobank-is-not-running-any-subsidy-reward-scheme","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/hoax-ecobank-is-not-running-any-subsidy-reward-scheme\/","title":{"rendered":"Hoax! Ecobank is not running any subsidy reward scheme"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Claim: A viral WhatsApp message says<\/strong> Ecobank rewards its clients in the \u201cNational Government with an $8000 subsidy.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Verdict: Hoax! Ecobank-Liberia says, \u201cIt is not running any subsidy reward scheme.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Full Text<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Recently, a message has been circulating on WhatsApp saying that Ecobank is granting a subsidy worth $8000 to clients with the Ecobank National Government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Participants of the scheme must provide their knowledge about the bank and answer a few questions about themselves to be considered a winner of the financial scheme.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DUBAWA checked the site to verify whether it was authentic or just a scam to dupe people of their money and\/or their personal information.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Verification<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

When clicked, the link <\/a>of the message takes users to a questionnaire page, where it is indicated that \u201cthrough the questionnaire, you will have a chance to get $8000.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
A Screenshot of the viral WhatsApp message\u00a0<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Also, several commenters are seen giving testimonies of how they have been rewarded for partaking in the scheme.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Screenshot of the site.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

DUBAWA decided to verify the claim by clicking on the page and answering the questions about the age range, bank rating, and gender.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like several other scam sites, users are instructed to share the program with five WhatsApp groups or 20 WhatsApp friends to win an $8000 congratulatory prize that appears after answering the questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After sharing, a complete registration form appeared where users were informed that it was the final step to getting the prize within five to seven days. Interestingly, a completely different<\/a> site popped up, where users were asked for their personal information, including a passcode and phone number.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This fact-checker scanned the site on scamdoc<\/a>, a web tool that evaluates digital identities, and the analysis show<\/a>ed that the site has a very bad trust index and the owner of the site\u2019s domain name is hidden.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although analysis from scamdoc doesn\u2019t influence the rating of a specific domain, this fact-checker, however, placed multiple calls to Ecobank-Liberia, requesting them to verify the claim being made on the site, after which they took to their official Facebook page<\/a> to announce that \u201cthe bank is not running any subsidy reward scheme\u201d and further cautioned people to \u201cavoid clicking any link requiring\u00a0 personal or bank details.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Screenshot of Ecobank announcement.\u00a0<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Conclusion<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The message circulating on WhatsApp that EcoBank is providing an $8000 reward scheme is a hoax.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The researcher produced this fact-check per the DUBAWA 2023 Kwame KariKari Fellowship in partnership with The Stage Media \u2013 Liberia, to facilitate the ethos of \u201ctruth\u201d in journalism and enhance media literacy in the country.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Claim: A viral WhatsApp message says Ecobank rewards its clients in the \u201cNational Government with an $8000 subsidy.\u201d Verdict: Hoax! Ecobank-Liberia says, \u201cIt is not running any subsidy reward scheme.\u201d Full Text Recently, a message has been circulating on WhatsApp saying that Ecobank is granting a subsidy worth $8000 to clients with the Ecobank National Government. Participants of the scheme must provide their knowledge about the bank and answer a few questions about themselves to be considered a winner of the financial scheme. DUBAWA checked the site to verify whether it was authentic or just a scam to dupe people of their money and\/or their personal information. Verification When clicked, the link of the message takes users to a questionnaire page, where it is indicated that \u201cthrough the questionnaire, you will have a chance to get $8000.\u201d Also, several commenters are seen giving testimonies of how they have been rewarded for partaking in the scheme. DUBAWA decided to verify the claim by clicking on the page and answering the questions about the age range, bank rating, and gender. Like several other scam sites, users are instructed to share the program with five WhatsApp groups or 20 WhatsApp friends to win an $8000 congratulatory prize that appears after answering the questions. After sharing, a complete registration form appeared where users were informed that it was the final step to getting the prize within five to seven days. Interestingly, a completely different site popped up, where users were asked for their personal information, including a passcode and phone number. This fact-checker scanned the site on scamdoc, a web tool that evaluates digital identities, and the analysis showed that the site has a very bad trust index and the owner of the site\u2019s domain name is hidden.\u00a0 Although analysis from scamdoc doesn\u2019t influence the rating of a specific domain, this fact-checker, however, placed multiple calls to Ecobank-Liberia, requesting them to verify the claim being made on the site, after which they took to their official Facebook page to announce that \u201cthe bank is not running any subsidy reward scheme\u201d and further cautioned people to \u201cavoid clicking any link requiring\u00a0 personal or bank details.\u201d Conclusion The message circulating on WhatsApp that EcoBank is providing an $8000 reward scheme is a hoax. The researcher produced this fact-check per the DUBAWA 2023 Kwame KariKari Fellowship in partnership with The Stage Media \u2013 Liberia, to facilitate the ethos of \u201ctruth\u201d in journalism and enhance media literacy in the country.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14426,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"hannibal_claim_source":"","hannibal_source_label":"","hannibal_card_color":"blue","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_wpscppro_dont_share_socialmedia":false,"_wpscppro_custom_social_share_image":0,"_facebook_share_type":"","_twitter_share_type":"","_linkedin_share_type":"","_pinterest_share_type":"","_linkedin_share_type_page":"","_instagram_share_type":"","_medium_share_type":"","_threads_share_type":"","_google_business_share_type":"","_bluesky_share_type":"","_mastodon_share_type":"","_selected_social_profile":[],"_wpsp_enable_custom_social_template":false,"_wpsp_social_scheduling":{"enabled":false,"datetime":null,"platforms":[],"status":"template_only","dateOption":"today","timeOption":"now","customDays":"","customHours":"","customDate":"","customTime":"","schedulingType":"absolute"},"_wpsp_active_default_template":true},"categories":[120,1571],"tags":[],"verdict":[],"ppma_author":[3786],"class_list":["post-14425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-fact-check"],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8R6dE-3KF","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"authors":[{"term_id":3786,"user_id":0,"is_guest":1,"slug":"gloria-wleh","display_name":"Gloria Wleh","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&r=g","author_category":"","user_url":"","last_name":"","first_name":"","job_title":"","description":""}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/image.png?fit=483%2C280&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14425"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14430,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14425\/revisions\/14430"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14425"},{"taxonomy":"verdict","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/verdict?post=14425"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=14425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}