A RED WhatsApp pop-up must never be ignored – it could save you from serious danger.
You may never have seen it before, but once it appears you need to be very cautious.
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It’s called the Suspicious Link pop-up, and it’s a message that appears on top of texts that have been sent to you.
WhatsApp flags it if it thinks you’ve been sent a dangerous link.
“This indicator may appear when a link contains a combination of characters that is considered unusual,” WhatsApp advised.
“Spammers may use these character combinations to trick you into tapping on links that appear to go to a legitimate website, but actually take you to a malicious site.”
For instance a link might use the letter ẉ instead of w to trick you into visiting a dangerous website.
Once you’ve clicked a malicious link, there’s no telling how it could affect your life.
It might be a con to trick you into handing over money or financial in exchange for something you’ll never receive.
Or you may be duped into giving up private personal info that can be used to defraud you.
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It could also lead to you unwittingly installing dangerous malware that lets hackers spy on you.
This could result in hackers stealing your photos, breaking into your accounts, and even raiding the contents of your bank.
“When receiving links, carefully review the content of the message,” WhatsApp warned.
“If a link is marked suspicious, you can tap the link and a pop-up message will appear, highlighting the unusual characters within the link.
“Then you can choose to open the link or go back to the chat.”
WhatsApp says that it automatically performs these checks on links.
But it’s not actually “seeing” the messages, because they’re end-to-end encrypted.
The checks take place “entirely on your device”, so the messages in question stay private from would-be snoopers.
However if you report the message in the app, it will be sent to WhatsApp for review.
