Derbyshire business owner raises awareness of online hacker after computer filled with indecent photographs of children

Carlo Laurenti, who owns and runs Derbyshire Wedding and Events, recently clicked a link after receiving a notification on Facebook to say his page was suspected of impersonating another.

But within seconds of clicking the malicious link Carlo’s computer was filled with images – including indecent photographs of children – and the businessman was locked out of his business page.

He said: “I was having very graphic images coming on, worst of all even child porn. I was absolutely lost, trying to unplug things but the damage was done.

“All it takes is that moment of distraction, being caught under pressure.”

“If in doubt, just don’t click.”

Due to the nature of the images Carlo immediately contacted the police who are continuing with their #SockItToTheScammers campaign – calling on people to ‘stop, think, tell’ about scams.

Detective Sergeant Steve Judge, who leads the Cybercrime and Digital Investigations Unit which dealt with Carlo’s case said: “Sadly we are seeing criminal hackers using indecent images of children to ‘cover their tracks’ after gaining access to business pages on social media.

“Once they have gained access to an account through the victim clicking a link, they will look to take any personal or financial details from the page, even buying advertising, before posting explicit images to get the page shut down by Facebook.”

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He continued: “In Derbyshire we have worked with Facebook to help victims of hacking to regain access to their accounts.

“We have also done further work to review Facebook’s processes, to ensure that they can pinpoint the hackers rather than punish the victims of hacking by erasing all trace of valuable pages that people rely on for their businesses.”

To protect against these scams, always ensure that you have two factor authentication enabled on your accounts, this adds a second layer of security when you or someone else is trying to log into your account.

More information on how to keep safe online can be found on Derbyshire Constabulary’s website. To watch the police's full video with Carlo, head to their YouTube account.