The holiday season is well underway, which means people are doing lots of online shopping and with more shopping comes more risk for scams.
A spokesperson from the Better Business Bureau said scammers are becoming more creative, and impacting people in all different age groups.
Whitney Adkins, BBB’s Director of Communications, said scammers have even started using AI to make a website or an ad look more convincing. She added while online shopping scams are common, scammers are even going a step further.
Adkins said scam sites that mirror legitimate sites, like Dick’s Sporting Goods, this happens with them a lot for some reason. People think they are ordering from an ad for Dick’s Sporting Goods for a sale, and then the website itself looks very convincing, but it turns out to be a scam, fraudulent copy cut site.
Other common scams have to do with packages, whether it’s a text claiming to be from a mailing service or a fake job listing to handle other people’s packages.
Adkins said they have seen a lot is Indeed listings or other job site listings for what is called a reshipping scam, or reshipping job. This is typically a job listing for something like ‘package inspector,’ ‘package shipper or handler,’ but it involves receiving other people’s packages at your home and then sending them out to a provided address.
While pets are a common holiday gift, some have communicated with people claiming to be breeders about animals that do not exist.
The scammer will usually make up a bunch of different lies about, ‘oh, you need to pay for the freight’ or ‘you need to pay for extra insurance before we can deliver the animal’ and they will keep making up more and more fake fees until the victim catches on.
Adkins said while older people can fall for scams due to not typically being as tech savvy, the BBB has seen a rise in younger people falling for them, too.
As for tips, when it comes to websites, Adkins recommended looking at them carefully for anything that may seem off, and if there is a deal on a product that seems too good to be true, it most likely is.
In terms of pet scams, the BBB recommends that people see the pet they want to buy in person before handing any money over.
One of the biggest tips Adkins had was doing the research, looking up a company and reading the reviews, before making a purchase.
Source: WAVE
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