Chocolate company Cadbury warns public not to fall for social-media scam that claims to offer free Easter hampers to users

• Chocolate manufacturer Cadbury recently warned people about a WhatsApp message scam.
• The scam purports to offer people free Cadbury Easter hampers via a link in a message.

The British confectioner Cadbury says messages circulating on social media, which claim to offer free chocolate, are fake.

In a tweet, the company urged the public not to interact with the messages and said it is working to resolve the issue.

"We've been made aware of circulating posts on social media claiming to offer consumers a free Easter chocolate basket," it said.

The company added: "We can confirm this hasn't been generated by us & we urge consumers not to interact. Your security is our priority & we're currently working to resolve this."

Sky News reported that people had received messages containing a link offering the chocolate.

Merseyside Police also warned the public in a tweet, saying that while it recognized people might find it hard to resist the offer, it was a scam "designed to gain access to your personal details."

WhatsApp and Cadbury did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment made outside of normal working hours.

According to the Evening Standard, the scam appeared to be connected to a data harvesting operation in Russia. The outlet reported that images of the text posted on social media showed a WhatsApp message containing a link to a Russian URL that deceives people into clicking on it.

There has been an uptick in scamming activity since the start of the Ukraine invasion in February. Security experts recently warned that scammers were taking advantage of the war to trick people into donating to fake causes.