Updated: Phony Foursquare Emails Link to Pharmacy Websites

In the past we’ve seen spammers imitate emails from YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn and Tagged in order to direct users to pharmacy websites, so it’s not all that surprising to find out that they’ve added Foursquare to the mix.

The email we received this morning - which has a spoofed date to keep it at the top of the inbox for most of the day - posed as a notice from the popular location-based social networking site that someone had just approved me as a friend.

Now, I knew the email was fake the moment I received it since I personally don’t use Foursquare, but I could see how an actual user could be lead to believe that it’s real.

From: foursquare (noreply@foursquare.com)

Subject: Jacqueline Turner is now your friend

Received: Friday, April 20, 2012 4:46 PM

Foursquare

Hey there - Just a heads up that Jacqueline Turner has approved your friend request on foursquare.View their profile: https://foursquare.com/user/46711115

Have fun!
- Your friends @ foursquare

foursquare labs, Inc. 568 Broadway, New York, NY 10012

Please remember you can always go to your User Settings page to adjust your account and contact info, privacy controls, email preferences and options linking to Twitter and Facebook.

So what happens if you click on any link within the Foursquare spam message?

In this particular case, you would’ve been redirected to a pharmaceutical website, but I would not put it past spammers to switch it up and start sending users to sites that actually serve malware.

With all of this in mind, if you receive any emails purporting to be from Foursquare, make sure you take a moment to check the true destination URL for any embedded links before clicking on them. All you have to do is mouseover the link and observe the URL that pops up (usually in your browser status bar).

Update: Apparently a lot of people have been receiving Foursquare spam and have contacted the company via Twitter to report it.

Foursquare is aware of the spam campaigns hitting folks' email inboxes and have confirmed that the emails are not coming from them.

Have you received any Foursquare spam?

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