A widely circulated message on WhatsApp and other social media platforms claims that the Federal Government of Nigeria is currently distributing free solar cookers to more than 10 million Nigerians across the 36 states of the nation.
This information is misleading and inaccurate because it includes a link that asks people to click and apply for the supposed “Solar-Power Clean Cooking Initiative.”
It is important to note here that the Federal Government chiefly uses official websites that carry .gov or .gov.ng to communicate and provide services to the public, and not personal links or websites.
A closer look at the provided link https://solarpower.giving-out.buzz for the solar cookers reveals that the landing site does not belong to the federal government.
Furthermore, when the link in the WhatsApp message that is being circulated was clicked, the image below is where it landed.
The above images show that this is a phishing scheme intended to aggregate personal information of unsuspecting Nigerians for fraudulent use by those behind this scheme.
From the above image, at least 9,915 unsuspecting Nigerians have registered to participate in the scheme.
While it is true that the Federal Government of Nigeria did, at some point, launch a free solar cooker programme for Nigerians to benefit from, this current viral message has no direct link to the Federal Government.
Similar scams have circulated in the past, using fake “free government programmes” as bait to harvest personal details or trick people into sharing the fraudulent links further.
Verdict: False
The Federal Government is not giving out free solar cookers to 10 million Nigerian households. Nigerians should disregard the message and avoid clicking the fraudulent link.
