Scammers impersonate Mr Beast to promote fake YouTube “giveaways”

YouTube philanthropist Jimmy ‘Mr Beast’ Donaldson opened up on Twitter about how a devious scammer is trying to trick viewers with a fake PlayStation network gift card “giveaway” by using his face.

Mr Beast’s rise on YouTube has been explosive – and for good reason. The 21-year-old dedicates his channel to giving away an absurd amount of cash to those in need. And in December 2019, his environmental initiative reached its goal to plant 20 million trees.

Despite the young entertainer’s dedication to spread goodwill to the world, it’s also began to attract those looking to take advantage of it. On April 19, the philanthropist revealed on his social media that scammers are using his image to promote illegitimate “giveaways.”

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Mr Beast calls out scammers using his image

Over the last couple of years, Google has been faced with the challenge of clamping down on spam bots in the comment section of YouTube. Often these accounts impersonate famous channels, and promote a “free giveaway.”

However, now the platform’s latest star Mr Beast appears to be the target of a new scam, and informed his viewers on Twitter about a fraudulent advertisement using his face to promote a PSN gift card scam.

“Almost every other tweet I’ve gotten recently is about this fake ad, I let youtube know If it doesn’t come from a verified MrBeast, it’s not me,” he said in a tweet.

Almost every other tweet I’ve gotten recently is about this fake ad, I let youtube know ❤️

If it doesn’t come from a verified MrBeast, it’s not me. pic.twitter.com/K1Af1oTET2

— MrBeast (@MrBeastYT) April 19, 2020

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Many of his followers replied to the post, disgusted that anyone would use his charity to take advantage of others. User ‘leisen09′ uploaded an image of another apparent scammer impersonating Mr Beast and commenting on users’ channels.

Another creator on the platform, CaptainSauce, replied to Mr Beast saying that his vide’s were also being used to make fake ads. Unfortunately, he claims he’s struggled to get help with it.

“Good luck getting them to do anything about it. For the last 2 months i’ve had my videos used for take ads and 12 copyright strikes later YouTube still doesn’t stop them,” he said.

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While it’s shocking that someone would use Mr Beast’s charitable video format to scam the less fortunate, it appears this has been an issue that other creators have been facing as well.

At the time of writing, YouTube has yet to respond. Although according to the philanthropist, his viewers are letting him know as soon as these ads are going up, so hopefully they are being taken down due to their reports.

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