Do Twitch and Discord Have a New Partnership? Read This Before Clicking Any Invite

You'd hope that a pandemic would bring the world together (figuratively, because doing it literally right now would be bad) but unfortunately some people feel the need to make things worse when they're already bad. While the novel coronavirus rages on, people now have to worry about a rise in phishing attempts and scams, like one that left people who were stuck inside making their own coffee feeling disheartened when they learned that they were definitely not getting a $100 Starbucks gift card.

The latest scam targets those who have been practicing safe social distancing to avoid catching or spreading COVID-19. If you're a gamer, whether you're a serious one or one who just engages in some fun games with friends who are elsewhere, you've likely heard of Discord and even used it yourself.

In fact, in this time of social distancing, you may be relying on it now more than ever. Which is why it would be a bad time for your server to suddenly be destroyed. If you fall victim to the latest Twitch and Discord partnership scam, that may just end up happening.

Recently, Discord users have been getting some rather strange messages on their servers. They come from a bot simply called Twitch and they announce an "Exclusive Partnership" between Discord and Twitch. One reads, "We are super happy to announce that Discord has partnered with Twitch to show some love to our super great users! From March 30, 2020 until April 6, 2020, all our users will have access to a Nitro Games." It then prompts user to invite the bot to their servers by clicking a link.

Another changes the dates slightly to go from March 26 to March 31. Another adds additional steps, saying that you must "join the Discord Official Events server" before adding the bot to your servers. Some messages also claim that you will also receive three free months of Twitch Prime.

If the poor grammar of the messages didn't tip you off, then maybe the fact that Nitro Games doesn't exist anymore did. While Twitch and Discord do have a bit of a partnership that allows Twitch streamers to link their channels to a Discord server, Twitch has no involvement in the now defunct Nitro Games. And neither online platform has announced any plans to revive the game catalogue. 

Unfortunately, some people have fallen victim to the scam, but they're sharing their stories and trying to prevent others from making the same mistake. According to Twitter user ShaxxMotivation, four things can happen if you invite the bot to your server. 

The first is that it will DM everyone in your server. It can also prune your server. By pruning, it will kick off people who have been inactive on the server for a certain amount of time. When used effectively, pruning can actually help your server thrive. But pruning can kill a server if it's set to remove people who have been inactive for barely a day, since that's likely to be nearly everyone. 

It may also ban everyone on your server or it can delete all of your channels. No matter which option you get, whether it's one of them or all of them, it's bad news. If you do get a message from the bot, be sure to report it to Discord's Trust & Safety team.