It happens to the best of us; being scammed by online predators. So what can you do or look out for when advertising online?
You've heard of Nigerian scams and trust me they truly do exist and I know from multiple personal experiences:
1) when trying to sell my Landrover back in 2002 I fell right into a scam. I was contacted by someone saying he was a Prince of an African country. He sent me a check for MORE than what I wanted, to cover the costs of shipping the car oversees. I deposited the check and next thing I knew all my bank accounts were frozen for cashing a fraudulent check. Luckily i was smart enough to wait to send the car till the check cleared so was merely inconvenienced.
2) In 2011 I was advertising to be a personal assistant and was contacted by a "start-up" company in New York who needed advertising immediately online. They wanted me to advertise for them on Yahoo Hot Jobs. He gave me a credit card number to pay for the first week of advertising. The name on the card never matched his name. He also stated he worked with an attorney and used him as a reference. I called the so called attorney and he had a Nigerian accent. All my red flags were up. I didn't want to risk my craigslist account so told him I'd set him up his own craigslist account verified by his cell number. At first he questioned it and then agreed. Both numbers were not recognized by Craigslist and so I asked him straight out if he was trying to scam me. We were on yahoo messenger. At first he denied it and on pushing him for answers he agreed it was a scam. THEN he messaged me 3 people's complete information (social security numbers, bank account info, passwords for emails etc.) I was completely shocked and he asked me to join his scam. When i refused he started cursing at me. I contacted the FBI who did nothing about it, and took it upon myself to call 1 of the phone numbers to warn them about the scammer having access to their information. They were so grateful but at first thought I was the scammer. Its scary to think there are people out there with YOUR information! Soo, its important you don't take on the attitude that it could never happen to you and arm yourself with the right information to avoid online predators.
Firstly identify and acknowledge the fact that you might be more vulnerable to scams because of your financial situation. Don't be afraid to ask questions OR to fully research the company they CLAIM they are.
1) NEVER pay any money upfront for ANYTHING (work-from-home businesses, timeshare re-sale companies etc)
2) If they are asking for your Paypal account info or if they are immediately saying they want to pay you through Paypal its a Scam.
3) To email inquiries to your ads look for these things:
5) The latest scammers are also using email addresses that end with a "corporate sounding" email address, i.e. not gmail, hotmail, aol etc - copy the end of the email address and put it into a search engine in every way For ex. my email ends with @anywhereadvertisingonline.com, therefore put into google search "anywhere advertising online" and anywhereadvertisingonline.com
6) Also look out for those claiming they are out of the country - this is a SCAM for whatever you are asking for like if you are looking for a room to rent or if you are trying to sell something.
More on this topic later. Stay tuned.
Thanks
Georgie
You've heard of Nigerian scams and trust me they truly do exist and I know from multiple personal experiences:
1) when trying to sell my Landrover back in 2002 I fell right into a scam. I was contacted by someone saying he was a Prince of an African country. He sent me a check for MORE than what I wanted, to cover the costs of shipping the car oversees. I deposited the check and next thing I knew all my bank accounts were frozen for cashing a fraudulent check. Luckily i was smart enough to wait to send the car till the check cleared so was merely inconvenienced.
2) In 2011 I was advertising to be a personal assistant and was contacted by a "start-up" company in New York who needed advertising immediately online. They wanted me to advertise for them on Yahoo Hot Jobs. He gave me a credit card number to pay for the first week of advertising. The name on the card never matched his name. He also stated he worked with an attorney and used him as a reference. I called the so called attorney and he had a Nigerian accent. All my red flags were up. I didn't want to risk my craigslist account so told him I'd set him up his own craigslist account verified by his cell number. At first he questioned it and then agreed. Both numbers were not recognized by Craigslist and so I asked him straight out if he was trying to scam me. We were on yahoo messenger. At first he denied it and on pushing him for answers he agreed it was a scam. THEN he messaged me 3 people's complete information (social security numbers, bank account info, passwords for emails etc.) I was completely shocked and he asked me to join his scam. When i refused he started cursing at me. I contacted the FBI who did nothing about it, and took it upon myself to call 1 of the phone numbers to warn them about the scammer having access to their information. They were so grateful but at first thought I was the scammer. Its scary to think there are people out there with YOUR information! Soo, its important you don't take on the attitude that it could never happen to you and arm yourself with the right information to avoid online predators.
Firstly identify and acknowledge the fact that you might be more vulnerable to scams because of your financial situation. Don't be afraid to ask questions OR to fully research the company they CLAIM they are.
1) NEVER pay any money upfront for ANYTHING (work-from-home businesses, timeshare re-sale companies etc)
2) If they are asking for your Paypal account info or if they are immediately saying they want to pay you through Paypal its a Scam.
3) To email inquiries to your ads look for these things:
- Does the name on the email match the name signing the email
- Is their grammar correct? - This is the easiest way to identify a scammer because more often than not they are use online translators which are usually not correct, grammatically.
- Are they asking you stupid questions like "Is this still for sale" or questions you already answered on the ad.
- Is there a company signature with FULL details about the contact info and location of the company they claim to be
- Are they asking you for very specific information upfront like full name, address, where you work etc
5) The latest scammers are also using email addresses that end with a "corporate sounding" email address, i.e. not gmail, hotmail, aol etc - copy the end of the email address and put it into a search engine in every way For ex. my email ends with @anywhereadvertisingonline.com, therefore put into google search "anywhere advertising online" and anywhereadvertisingonline.com
6) Also look out for those claiming they are out of the country - this is a SCAM for whatever you are asking for like if you are looking for a room to rent or if you are trying to sell something.
More on this topic later. Stay tuned.
Thanks
Georgie
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