Well done, everyone. The internet is often portrayed as a hive of negativity, but last week, the global community came together to protect kids from falling victim to an online scam. The scam in question concerned a fake Android version of the hit game Fortnite: Battle Royale.
Fortnite is more than just a hit game; it is the biggest game ever. It has recently launched on iOS, but Epic Games, the developers behind Fortnite, haven’t yet to launched an Android version. There is no Android version of Fortnite: Battle Royale. This leaves fans of the game at risk as scammers seek to capitalize on the millions of young people around the world who are searching for Fortnite on Android.
One such scam was a video posted on YouTube, which ended up reaching YouTube’s front page. The video said that to unlock Fortnite on Android users needed to “install a few other apps.” Whereas this type of action is clearly a scam, it might not be spotted so easily by a child. To find out what was going on Reddit user u/UndersizedAlpaca took to Reddit, to call out YouTube, asking, “Why is a video designed to scam children allowed to be advertised, YouTube?”
The post in r/videos quickly became one of the most popular posts ever and racked up almost 3,000 comments. The video in question was reported, as was the account that posted it, and many users began highlighting other accounts and websites that had been posting malicious content and pushing scams. The online community was on to what one user called a YouTube plague.
Many of the videos that were highlighted have since been removed by YouTube and, accordingly, the internet is a safer place for kids who are waiting on the Android version of Fortnite: Battle Royale. There are still scams out there, however, with many of them offering APK downloads for fake versions and all needing to be avoided. Epic Games has said, that it is aiming for a summer release of an Android version of Fortnite, so until then avoid anything that offers an Android version of Fortnite.
Once summer comes around, however, do not download anything until you’ve heard an official announcement and you can be sure it is coming from an official source. Even with an army of internet users out there trying to protect Fortnite fans, scams still exist, and if you’re not careful, you could still end up a victim.
