Whatsapp offer of free 50GB data is a Hoax!

A viral WhatsApp message claims WhatsApp is offering free 50GB data to mark its 10th anniversary.

A confirmatory email from the social media giant’s support team disavowed this assertion, labelling it a “hoax”. Moreover, WhatsApp is eleven years old, debuting in 2009, thereby putting to rest this falsehood. 

Full Text

A WhatsApp web link message claims WhatsApp is giving out free 50GB  that will last for 90 days to users of varied network services.

The message lingers with a two-line testimony attesting: “I have received mine. Hurry before it is exhausted”.

Verification

First of all, Dubawa explored the origin of the WhatsApp Application to ascertain how old it is, so as to corroborate it with the alleged number of years the message claims WhatsApp is celebrating. 

Dubawa tweeted at WhatsApp requesting for the verification of the message, but there has been no reply to the tweet so far. 

Dubawa further sent an email to the WhatsApp Support Team after conducting a trial by following the link and the instructions that followed. 

It turned out that the procedure was a mere ruse and never delivered what it claims to offer.

How old is WhatsApp?

Whatsapp is 11 years old now as it was founded by Brian Acton and Jan Koum in February 2009.

WhatsApp with more than 2billion users in over 180 countries, was bought over by Mark Zuckerberg, CEO Facebook in Pip for $19bn.

Following the link attached to the WhatsApp message, the page below opened, asking the user how he/she heard about the offer with WhatsApp, Facebook, Google and friends as options.

After choosing WhatsApp, the page asked the user what he/she thinks of the app and if the app will be suggested to friends.

After answering all these questions, it is no surprise that the page requests the user to share the message to 20 friends or 5 groups on WhatsApp. 

Every attempt to go further is blocked with a pop-up message stating the message must be shared as requested before the user can access the alleged reward of 50GB.

Requesting users to share the message suggesting receipt of reward before receiving it is deceptive and questions the credibility of that message and link.

Below this message on the page is testimonials by different users.

Finally, Dubawa reached out to the WhatsApp support team via email on the authenticity of this claim and the team replied saying that the message is a hoax and not from WhatsApp. The support team, therefore, advised that the message be disregarded and not shared. 

“The message or call you received is a hoax from an unauthorized third party and didn’t come from WhatsApp. Please disregard these messages or calls and don’t share them with your contacts.”

Excerpt from the email.