Subscription trap in the name of internet offers on Facebook ads
Recently, several Facebook pages shared posts announcing a special mobile internet offer for specific SIM users. The posts claimed that users could get this offer without spending any money. From April to July, at least 10 Facebook pages spread such posts, some even running advertisements. But Dismislab’s fact-check shows that these are not real offer posts, and rather a scam to collect users’ OTP and subscribe them to a different value-added service, causing financial loss.
In most Facebook of the fake offers, the description starts with: “Exclusive limited-time mega internet offer. 25 GB premium internet – completely free!” The posts (1, 2, 3) mentioned the SIM names as Grameenphone, Robi, Banglalink, and Airtel. In the description, to get free data, users were asked to click the “Learn More” button at the bottom of the post, which contained the link. It also promised that users would have the free data activated after answering some simple questions.
An analysis of the posts shows that the language of each caption is identical. A keyword search found that at least 11 Facebook pages, including “Free Data World 2025,” “Bangla Free Internet,” and “Net Offer Ghor,” have been posting the same type of offers since April. In almost every card, multiple photos of actresses Mehazabien Chowdhury and Tanjin Tisha were used to promote the offer.
A search in the Meta Ad Library with the keyword “25 GB premium internet — completely free!” found more than 14 [specify figure] such ads were running on July 10 alone. The next day, July 11, two more ads were active.
In the Facebook posts where direct links were shared, clicking the “Learn More” option led users to fake websites. These looked like proxy sites with names such as myofferbd.shop or freedatahub.shop. At the very beginning of these sites, a message appeared: “To get this offer, you must submit your mobile number and verify with the OTP sent to your phone.” Below this instruction, a 2-minute timer started. Then a list appeared with offers like “Banglalink 25 GB free internet,” “Grameenphone 25 GB free internet,” “Robi 25 GB free internet,” “Airtel 25 GB free internet,” as well as “All minute offers,” “Banglalink 200 minutes free,” and “Grameenphone 200 minutes free.”
Clicking on any of these offers took the user to a special kind of proxy website. There, the first thing asked was the phone number. In Dismislab’s verification, after entering a number for testing, an instant message came. It said: “Use pin code 9578 to activate the Cloud7 Funbox Daily service.” The moment this PIN or OTP was entered, the phone number got linked to a third-party value-added service (VAS). In one such service, it said that activating the service would cost 3.03 taka per day, and it would run automatically. As a result, without knowing, money could start being deducted from users’ mobile balances every day.
However, no such promotions were found on the official websites of Airtel, Banglalink, Grameenphone, or Robi. When asked about these Facebook ads, Banglalink and Grameenphone said they did not run such ads. They confirmed that all their offers are only published on their official mobile apps and websites. So, if an offer is not mentioned on the official app, website, or verified page, then they have no connection with such ads spread from other sources.
Among the 10 pages that posted the offer, the admin location of three was found in Bangladesh, while the rest did not mention any admin location. All these pages were created between April and June this year.
This is not the first time that scammers used Facebook to offer free packages or discounts as if they were from telecom companies or other popular brands. Earlier, Dismislab published fact-check reports about fake offers spread in the name of Aarong and bKash on the occasion of Women’s Day.
Disclaimer: The original version of this fact-check report was published in Bengali on Dismislab’s Bengali website on July 14, 2025. The English translation was completed later; however, to maintain time accuracy and avoid any potential misinterpretation, the English version has been published with the original publication date.
