Scam Alert: Fake O2 Texts and Aldi Air-Con Sites
Two scams are doing the rounds this week and both are worth thirty seconds of your attention. One is a fake text pretending your O2 SIM is about to be switched off. The other is aimed squarely at anyone melting in this heatwave and trying to buy a fan or an air-con unit online. They look unrelated. What links them is timing: scammers watch what people are worried about, then push on exactly that.
Here's what both look like, and how to not lose anything to either.
1. The "Your O2 SIM Is About To Be Deactivated" Text
A text lands claiming to be from O2. The wording is designed to make you panic slightly: "O2UK: IMPORTANT: Your SIM Card(s) will be inactive on 04/06/2026, because you have NOT signed our Terms and Conditions. Logon to sign." There's a link. Tap it and you land on a page that looks exactly like the MyO2 login. Enter your details and you've just handed your account to a stranger.
Once they're in, they can take over the account, and because your mobile number is the thing a lot of banks and email providers use to verify you, it doesn't stop at your phone bill.
O2 put out an official warning about this on 30 June 2026. They've blocked over a billion scam messages already, which tells you the scale of it. Murray Mackenzie, their Director of Fraud Prevention, put it plainly: "Scammers are becoming more sophisticated, using increasingly believable and urgent requests to target victims alongside convincing fake websites, demonstrating just how clever their tactics can be."
The one thing to hold onto: O2 never texts you asking you to sign terms and conditions to stop your SIM being switched off. Never. That message doesn't exist as a real thing.
Don't tap the link. If you want to check your account, open the MyO2 app or dial 202 from your phone. Forward the dodgy text to 7726. And if you already put your login in, change your MyO2 password straight away. Similar texts go out pretending to be EE, Vodafone and Three too, so the same rule applies whoever your network is.
2. Fake Aldi Air-Con Sites Cashing In On The Heat
Air conditioning units and portable coolers have sold out at the real shops this week. Scammers noticed. Security firm Kaspersky has found a whole network of fake websites built to look exactly like Aldi's, right down to the logo, the colours and the layout, all selling AC units at prices that are too good to walk past.
One listing offered an "energy efficient cooling system" at £28.13, marked down from £64.44, with a "only 5 left" warning ticking away. Another had a "premium 3-in-1 portable air conditioner" at £149.99, supposedly down from £474.99. Countdown timers. Fake live viewer counts. Discounts about to expire. All of it engineered to get you to type in your card number before you've had a proper think.
You pay. Nothing arrives. Your card details are now theirs. IBTimes UK reported the Kaspersky research, and Aldi has confirmed it actively hunts down and reports these copycat domains.
Kaspersky's Olga Altukhova summed up why it works: "Artificial pressure is a primary weapon for online thieves. When demand spikes, warnings about low stock or expiring discounts compel people to act before they think. The heat makes buyers impatient, and impatience leads to mistakes."
The fix is boring but it works: never buy through a link in an email or a social media ad. Get to the shop yourself. Type the address in, or search for it and check the domain properly before you go anywhere near the checkout. If the deal only exists behind a link someone sent you, that's your answer.
If It's Already Happened
If you've tapped a link and entered details, or paid one of these fake sites, don't sit on it:
- Call your bank now. The number on the back of your card. If you paid a fake shop, they can often stop or claw back the payment if you're quick.
- Change the password for whatever you logged into: your MyO2 account, your email, anything you reused that same password on.
- Turn on two-factor authentication where you can, especially email. It's the thing that stops a stolen password being enough on its own.
- If someone talked you through installing anything on your PC as part of it, treat that machine as compromised until it's been checked. Remote-access software means they could have seen or copied whatever was open.
How to Report These
- Scam text → forward it to
7726(free on all UK networks, spells SPAM) - Scam email → forward to
report@phishing.gov.uk - Money lost or card details handed over → report at reportfraud.police.uk or call on
0300 123 2040
It's worth the two minutes. The mobile networks' filters run on volume, and the more of these O2 texts get forwarded to 7726, the faster the fake login pages get taken down. Same with the fake shops: reporting them is how they get shut before they catch the next person.
And if a scammer has had remote access to your machine, or you're just not sure what got left behind after one of these, get it looked at. I handle virus and malware removal in St Helens and can check nothing's still sitting there watching.
Mark has been fixing computers since the late '90s and went self-employed in 2008. Based in St Helens since 2013, he works evenings and weekends from his home in Laffak — friendly, affordable repairs for PCs, laptops, and Macs. See reviews on Google
Think you've been scammed? Or had someone on your PC?
If you've let someone remote in, installed dodgy software, or just want your PC checked over — get in touch and I'll have a proper look.
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