FACT CHECK: Is TETFUND giving Nigerian students N30,000 grant?

Claim: 

A viral WhatsApp message claims Tetfund is giving ₦30,000 grants to Nigeria students

Conclusion: 

False, the website is fraudulent. Though it portrays the real logo of Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND) the website is not in any way related to the agency as it is neither registered in Nigeria nor does it operating from the country. It is a regurgitated scheme.

Full Text:

A viral WhatsApp message claimed Batch C payment of ₦30,000 grants to Nigerian students is currently ongoing. The message is accompanied by a link to the registration website.

The message reads;

“*TETFUND has approved the payment of N30,000*

To all Students Across Nigeria

“_*This is part of 2021 budget to support all Nigerian students*_

_Registration Portal has been Opened and Payment has began_

*Note* : Check if you’re eligible to get N30,000

_Click below to visit the official disbursement site_

https://bit.ly/Tetfund-Grant

Batch B payment has been completed. As Batch C payment and registration is ongoing now!!_”

Earlier in May, a similar message via bulk SMS was sent to some Nigerian students informing them they are eligible to collect grants of ₦20,00 from TETFUND.

The SMS reads thus: “Congratulations, You’re eligible to benefit from the ongoing TETFUND N20,000 Grant. You can accept the grant by clicking http://bit.ly/TETFUND-GRANTS today.”

Verification:

Ripples Nigeria followed the link attached to the message. It leads to a website with the URL tetfund.claimoffer.online with the TETFUND logo and a form to fill.

The form consists of name, residential address, phone number, email address, date of birth, name of institution and matric number with a yes or no button at the end just before the Apply now button.

Red flag 1: Without filling the form, the reporter clicked the Apply Now button and it leads to another page which asks the following questions

1. Are you a bonafide citizen of Nigeria?
2. Where do you study currently?
3. What will you use your ₦30,000 for?”

After answering the questions, it brought a congratulatory message and cloned Facebook comments with beneficiaries writing good reviews about the grant scheme.

The congratulatory message also asked the reporter to do the following things before getting credited; “Congratulations, you are eligible for the ₦30,000 TETFUND GRANT.

How to get your ₦30,000 credited to your account

1. Before you continue, click the green button “SHARE” and send this to 5 Whatsapp Groups (Only Groups) for other members to benefit from this.

2. After the sharing, you will be asked for account number and bank name to receive the ₦30,000.”

Ripples Nigeria can verify that the website is not related to the MDA responsible for tertiary education in the country as it does not have it’s URL extension ending with gov.ng like any MDA within the purview of the Nigerian government. The TETFUND has tetfund.gov.ng as its original website address.

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Further analysis of the website showed that Whois was employed. Whois is a query and response tool used for searching databases that stores registered users and assignees of an internet resource such as domain name, IP address block and a wide range of other information.

Whois.domaintools.com employed showed that the website’s main domain was claimoffer.net registered July 25, 2021 with a website title “Jumia 9ja shopping festival promo”.

The main website was visited and it was also discovered that it followed the same pattern of cloned Facebook comments and has nothing related to Jumia.

The domain was registered in Iceland and the current IP location is New Jersey, USA. The IP history shows that the IP address has been changed twice.

This is not the first agency of the federal government that such a scheme would be attached to. Ripples Nigeria checked out a similar scheme on the Corporate Affairs Commission and the Civil Service Commission, and found them to be false.