It's impossible to overestimate the power of expectations to create trust (even in the face of contrary indications).
This just almost happened to me this week: A couple of days ago I wrote an email to a friend I hadn't been in touch with for several years. A day later I got a message from him on Facebook with what looked like a YouTube link and the cryptic message, "It's you?"
I didn't want to see myself on a random youtube video I had never heard of, so I wrote back that I didn't want to click.
Then the next day my friend announced that his account had been hacked and that those messages were spam/malware, with a bad impersonation of a YouTube link. But I was so sure it was a legit message from my friend that I didn't even notice that the link didn't actually go to YouTube. Fortunately I never clicked it, but just like the OP, it was blind luck.
This just almost happened to me this week: A couple of days ago I wrote an email to a friend I hadn't been in touch with for several years. A day later I got a message from him on Facebook with what looked like a YouTube link and the cryptic message, "It's you?"
I didn't want to see myself on a random youtube video I had never heard of, so I wrote back that I didn't want to click.
Then the next day my friend announced that his account had been hacked and that those messages were spam/malware, with a bad impersonation of a YouTube link. But I was so sure it was a legit message from my friend that I didn't even notice that the link didn't actually go to YouTube. Fortunately I never clicked it, but just like the OP, it was blind luck.
[edit: fixed wording]