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NOTE: I am New contributor, if the question needs some improvement please tell in comment before down voting!

Usually I see messages on whatsapp and sometime on some other forums stating that forward this message to Ten or Twenty people and don't ignore. Apparently, there is nothing visible that could benefit that message writer. But still people write and innocent people do forward it. Yes, sometimes they include links saying click and get recharge which is obviously risky but I am more interested in the one that don't contain any link or are even voice notes.

Example:

✅ FINAL NOTICE "Dont ignore please read it carefully" Hello, I. Am JUAN CARLOS director of whatsapp, this message is to inform all of our users that we have sold whatsapp to Mark Zuckerberg for 19 billion $. WhatsApp is now controlled by mark zuckerberg. If you have at least 20 contacts send this sms and logo of your whatsapp will change to a new icon with facebook's "f" within 24 hours.Forward this message to more than 10 people to activate your new whatsapp with facebook services or else your account will be deleted from new servers. This is the final notice! Hello everyone, it seems that all the warnings were real, the use of WhatsApp cost money from summer 2017. If you send this string to 20 different on your list, your icon will be blue and will be free for you. If you do not believe me see tomorrow at 6 pm ending WhatsApp and have to pay to open it, this is by law This message is to inform all of our users, our servers have recently been very congested, so we are asking you to help us solve this problem. We require our active users to forward this message to each of the people in your contact list to confirm our active users using WhatsApp, if you do not send this message to all your contacts WhatsApp will then start to charge you. Your account will remain inactive with the consequence of losing all your contacts. Message from Jim Balsamic (CEO of Whatsapp ) we have had an over usage of user names on whatsapp Messenger. We are requesting all users to forward this message to their entire contact list. If you do not forward this message, we will take it as your account is invalid and it will be deleted within the next 48 hours. Please DO NOT ignore this message or whatsapp will no longer recognise your activation. If you wish to re-activate your account after it has been deleted, a charge of 25.00 will be added to your monthly bill. We are also aware of the issue involving the pictures updates not showing. We are working diligently at fixing this problem and it will be up and running as soon as possible. Thank you for your cooperation from the Whatsapp team” WhatsApp is going to cost us money soon. The only way that it will stay free is if you are a frequent user i.e. you have at least 10 people you are chatting with. To become a frequent user send this message to 10 people who receive it (2 ticks) and your WhatsApp logo should turn blue.

Forward this message to all WhatsApp contact.

Some other samples are here.

Edit:

The question is about "real" software virus. Is there some way to attach malicious content alongside a forward message to steal information or harm other devices. Because as in example, sometime it does not contain even a link to click but only alphabets.

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Ajwad Syed
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    Hi and welcome to the site! What is your question here? Do you want to know if the information in the message is true? Do you want to know how it spreads? – Anders Jul 07 '19 at 16:09
  • I fail to see how this is security related? [It's a chain letter](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chain_letter). It's a piece of text. – vidarlo Jul 08 '19 at 00:02
  • YES, this is the question. As I clearly mentioned in the title that is it possible that a chain letter could contain a virus/worm that could effect the devices to which it is forwarded.. – Ajwad Syed Jul 08 '19 at 06:53
  • Yellow text is just an EXAMPLE to convey my point. Actual question is only in the title. @Anders I suggest please read the question again. – Ajwad Syed Jul 08 '19 at 06:58
  • Otherwise I need moderator attention !! – Ajwad Syed Jul 08 '19 at 07:05
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    Is it a worm? Kind of, but it's not trying to attack software and it doesn't execute on a CPU. It executes in your brain! This is a hoax which tries to trick gullible people (the human equivalent of a software vulnerability) into spreading it, including its message. As such, this message does spread by hijacking people's trust. – forest Jul 08 '19 at 07:08
  • I have read the title. Do you want to know if the message contains some "real" software virus that helps it spread? Or are you interested in the psychology of chain letters? Do you understand how chain letters work? – Anders Jul 08 '19 at 08:26
  • Yes I understand about chain letters. I asked about "real" software virus. Is there some way to attach malicious content alongside a forward message to steal information or harm other devices. Because as in example, sometime it does not contain even a link to click but only alphabets. – Ajwad Syed Jul 08 '19 at 08:51
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    @AjwadTaqvi In theory yes, but that's not what this is. – forest Jul 08 '19 at 08:59

1 Answers1

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First thing first, the very link you cite says "hoax" right in the URL. Wiktionary defines the noun hoax thus:

Anything deliberately intended to deceive or trick.

That should be a pretty big clue right there that this isn't true.

According to Wikipedia, WhatsApp uses a centralized server architecture where messages are passed through and temporarily stored on their (er, likely Facebook's) servers on their way to the recipient.

Therefore,

To become a frequent user send this message to 10 people who receive it

is moot. WhatsApp (Facebook) can already compile data on how much you're using WhatsApp, broken down on messages sent and received, per contact, if they want to do so, without any need for you to take any particular action and certainly without involving a particular message text. I have no idea whether they are doing it, and I don't particularly care since I don't use WhatsApp at all, but I wouldn't be very surprised if they do have extensive traffic monitoring in place. It would be just another way for Facebook to gather data on people. (Facebook almost certainly didn't pay 19.3 billion USD for the service in 2014 just to be altruistic. Trust me, they saw a way to make more money than that out of it in a reasonable amount of time. Given that Facebook's business model centers around tracking their users and selling advertising targetted at selected subsets of that user base, it's a reasonable guess that their way of monetizing WhatsApp is similar and/or hooks into their larger platform.)

Wikipedia also notes that Facebook (not Mark Zuckerberg; why do people always seem to feel that using a single person's name increases credibility in these matters?) bought WhatsApp in 2014, and the message you quote claims that it would cost money beginning "summer" (which means what exactly, on the opposite hemisphere?) 2017. Since we're now well past 2017, the simple question becomes: does it cost money right now? Because if not, that claim is obviously false.

Remember that one of the classic tricks of the trade in deception and advertising alike is to create a sense of urgency.

All that aside, the English grammar and punctuation of that message is awful. No official communication from a US company providing a service used by one and a half billion users would be written like that.

In my book, such a message is either spam, chain mail, or a bad joke, depending on the way you look at it.

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