Kenya: Beware of Suspicious Facebook Page Impersonating Popular Kenyan YouTuber

20 January 2023
Africa Check (Johannesburg)
By Dancan Bwire

IN SHORT: Facebook is awash with misleading pages and posts offering quick loans to social media users. Unfortunately posts on a page claiming to be made by popular Kenyan YouTuber Mungai Eve are also fraudulent, and possibly attempts to scam the unsuspecting.

The Facebook page Mungai Eve Official is offering quick loans to Kenyan users.

The account uses the name and photos of Mungai Eve, a popular Kenyan YouTuber.

One of its posts, in English and Kiswahili and dated 18 January 2023, reads: "Good morning and congratulations kwa Wale ambao walipokea loan. Kama uko online na hukupokea loan whatsapp me Mungai Eve through 0738883166 ili upate loan yako sahi tu."

This translates as: "Good morning and congratulations to those who received the loan. If you are online and you did not receive the loan, WhatsApp me Mungai Eve through 0738883166 for you to receive it instantly."

Another post says that loans for school fees, business or personal use are available.

The posts have been shared widely.

But is the Facebook account really run by the YouTuber? We checked.

Fake Facebook page, fake offers

In the past, impersonators have used the names of famous people in Kenya to try to scam Facebook users.

We visited Mungai Eve's YouTube channel, which has over 670,000 subscribers. She has attached links to all her social media accounts.

Her legit Facebook page has over 264,000 followers. It uses the name "Mungai Eve" and its "page transparency" section shows it was created on 16 July 2021. It also features the videos published on her YouTube channel. None of the loan adverts appear on it.

The page offering loans was created a day later and has only 18,000 followers. It has mostly posted loan offers.

We could not find the phone number "0738883166" on any of Mungai Eve's legitimate social media accounts.

It is unlikely that the YouTuber would operate two Facebook accounts and dedicate one to giving loans.

The fake Facebook page's requests for users to engage on WhatsApp is likely to be an attempt to scam people.

To help protect yourself against online scams, see Africa Check's guide to Facebook scams and how to spot them.

Read the original story, with links and other resources.
Africa Check is a non-partisan organisation which promotes accuracy in public debate and in the media. Twitter @AfricaCheck and www.africacheck.org

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