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Edinburgh Live
Edinburgh Live
Entertainment
Stuart MacDonald & Abbie Meehan

Edinburgh TV star Gail Porter sends warning to fans over fake social media scam

Gail Porter has warned fans about a fake Instagram account that is using her name to try and scam people out of money.

The Scots TV presenter has hit out at a fraudster who is impersonating her on social media and contacting her followers.

She highlighted a fake account, urging followers not to fall for the fake page, which was set up recently.

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A private Instagram account under the name iamgailporter_ has tried to scam followers.

The account first messages followers and starts a conversation while pretending to be the former Top of the Pops host, with the fraudster then going on to ask for money.

Edinburgh-born Gail, 51, warned her 72,000 followers of her official account and told them she would never send a direct message asking for cash.

She said: "Someone created a new account pretending to be me. They have an underscore at the end of Porter.
"This account 2 posts and 750 followers, is not me. If you get contacted by this account, please report it. Apologies. People can be odd.

"Apparently the scammer has asked some people for money. Don't understand why people do that.

"I've reported the account that is impersonating me. If you get a DM from that account, please ignore them but report."

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Last year, Scots athlete Eilish McColgan also issued a warning to her followers about a fake account on Instagram.

The runner, who won 10,000m gold at the Commonwealth Games, highlighted an account which had been set up in the wake of her success to try to gain access to her followers' personal details.

Scots actor Sam Heughan has also previously hit out at scammers impersonating him on various messaging apps.

A number of women have been conned into handing over money to con artists in recent years after thinking they were messaging the Outlander star.

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