Scammers can hack your Instagram account without you knowing - these are the warning signs

dailyrecord.co.uk:

Instagram can offer a whole lot of entertainment - it's a place to find the latest fashion, hilarious memes, and to connect with friends.But the social media platform is all fun and games until your account gets hacked, that is.Even if you're not an influencer with thousands of followers, you can still be vulnerable to cybercriminals, and sometimes, it's not always obvious that you've been hacked.Digital security experts have explained the warning signs to look out for to see if your profile has been accessed by someone else, and what to do if you find yourself in that situation.“Instagram scams are rampant right now, a result of its growing popularity and influence,” says Tom Gaffney, principal security expert at F-Secure - who believes that fake brand accounts, usually pushing counterfeit goods, may be responsible.“The power of Instagram is in how many followers you have – the more followers these brands can build, the more they can push other nefarious activity.”Stuart Dobbie, SVP of innovation at Callsign, warns that fraudsters target social media accounts in an attempt to steal confidential information: “Regardless of whether you have a lot of followers, your Instagram profile will have your phone number, email address and other pieces of information private to you."If a fraudster hacks into this, they can access all of it – and they can then use this information elsewhere.”In some cases – usually accounts with many followers – the hackers will contact the owner and threaten to delete the account if a ransom (usually Bitcoin) isn’t paid.Gaffney adds: “Hackers don’t tend to differentiate on the target as their attacks are automated and at scale, this means they will affect users even with very few followers.”Unless