“Diablo 3 free download” scams target impatient users

Impatient gamers searching for the third installation of the popular Diablo role-playing game, hoping that has somehow been leaked ahead of its scheduled release on Tuesday, are finding survey scams instead.

Trend Micro researchers analyzed Google search results received when looking for “diablo 3 free download”, and discovered that some of the most prominent ones are websites that purportedly offer the game or its beta version, but ask the user to jump through hoops to get it.

One simply asks users to complete a survey in order to download the game.

Another one asks for much more – “sharing” the link to the site on Facebook, posting a message touting the site on their Facebook Wall and on three other game pages, and “liking” two unknown pages (click on the screenshot to enlarge it):

Once the users have performed all of these steps and try to download the game, they are faced with another hurdle: they have to complete a survey.

Needless to say, the game turns out to be only a lure. The users get nothing for their trouble, and scammers earn a commission for every completed survey.