With millions of online scams doing the rounds on the internet right now, web users must be very careful when it comes to their spending habits. To stay protected from various types of money fraud, users need to exercise caution while surfing online. Here are some simple tips to help you develop a better understanding of the different types of scams that you can find in the online world.
Non Delivery of Merchandise
With online retail sites becoming a very popular option with customers, one has to be careful about purchasing products through the web. Online retail sites like eBay for instance, encourage lots of traders to sell their products through the platform. Some of these sellers might be scammers with no intention of sending you the merchandise once you have paid for it. Rather, they disappear with you money just like they had done to many other customers in the past. To prevent this type of money fraud from happening to you, make it a point to do business only with traders who have generated a outstanding ratings from former customers.
FBI Scams
Do you ever receive mails in your inbox from the FBI? The mail would go onto declare that the agency is in possession of money which is supposed to be yours and that they are looking to return it to you. For starters, you must know right off the bat that this is another one of those money fraud scams and you should also check the e-mail id. If the sender has sent the mail through Gmail, Yahoo, Bing or another e-mail service provider rather than using a dedicated government id, it is definitely a scam. By promising to send you thousands of dollars, the scammer will lure you into making processing fees which will costs you a few hundreds dollars. Once you have made this payment, he will simply abscond with your cash and you would have just become a victim of online money fraud.
Web users must not that there are many variations of the same scam. For instance, you could be contacted by a rich family in Africa who is looking to move to the US after facing years of civil unrest in their country. They would ask your help in the transfer of funds while promising to provide a generous commission. Another variation of the scam that has gained notoriety in recent years has to do with you suddenly winning a lottery out of nowhere for hundreds of thousands of dollars. Or you would be just declared as the winners of a latest iPhone through a pop ad while casually surfing the web. You should never trust these kinds of random ads since they are just looking to take advantage of vulnerable people.
Identity Theft
This is one of the most dangerous types of money fraud since people do not realize for a long time that they are being scammed. Identity theft can occur in a lot of different ways. A cyber criminal can get hold of your confidential financial information if you were found to be using your credit card on unprotected sites or even by hacking into your account while using a public Wi-Fi facility. The criminal can then use your credit card to fund your various expenses until the maximum limit is reached. By that point, you could be left with a bill worth thousands of dollars. To make matters worse, there are certain cyber criminals who are very smart when comes to using stolen credit cards. Rather than make huge expenses with your card and they will make a series of small purchases over many months and remain under the radar because you may simply not have the time to run through statement in full detail.
In other variations of the same money fraud, people might hack your social media accounts to get in touch with people featured on your friends list. The scammers may send them emergency messages requesting them to help you by wiring money to an online bank account. This is especially true in cases while people are traveling abroad on vacation and scammers tend to surf through online profiles looking for people who are not in station. While some acquaintances might call up the person before sending the money, others will simply send the money immediately because the request came directly from your online account and also because it was an emergency. So you need to be always alerts.
Apart from these concerns, there are also other dangers related to this type of money fraud. For instance, scammers could use your credit card details to do business on illegal sites. They could also run a number of scams with your identity which could get you in serious trouble with the law. Hence all online users need to be very cautious when they are using their credit cards online. You must take a series of steps to prevent any possibility of money fraud.
For starters, do not ever store your log in and password details on your computer. Many users tend to store on their confidential financial information in a neat folder on their desktop which makes it easy for scammers to simply hack your account and then obtain the information. Use only one or two accounts for making online purchases and these should be different from your savings account. To prevent money fraud, you also need to make sure that you make payments only on sites that are fully complaint with the latest security protocols laid down by the payment industry.
Never make online payments while using a public Wi-Fi facility. There may be a scammer among the people who are using the same network and it becomes very easy for the person to track your online habits in real time. If you were found to be making an online payment, he can monitor that as well. Hence ensure that internet connection is fully secure while making payments.
The other thing that you should be doing is to install a quality anti virus software on your system. This is an important step towards protecting your self from money fraud. The software will regularly update itself and will prevent your computer from being attacked my spyware, malware and other virus programs.
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