Ever get a strange email from a friend or family member asking for money?
Monica Eaton, Co-Founder and COO at Chargebacks911, contributed some tips to an expert roundup for personal finance site OppLoans®. In the post, Monica and her fellow fraud prevention gurus provide 13 key tips to help consumers tell when they’re being scammed.
The key to picking out a scammer: look for the recurring warning signs. Criminals often employ fraudulent sites designed to trick users into voluntarily handing-over their information. Anything from simple typos to requesting payments in a non-reversible form can be a giveaway.
As Monica explains, a site that’s not secured by the right protocol can present dangers, too. “NEVER make purchases at a website with an ‘http’ URL. Only make purchases on websites that are ‘https’,” she says. “The ‘s’ indicates a higher level of security. Nowadays, all reputable eCommerce sites are https, including the major airlines, banks, stores, hotels and retail chains.”
Monica also points to domain squatting as a possible risk factor. Criminals may set up dummy sites with URLs that are very similar to popular eCommerce sites; for example, one might duplicate the Amazon homepage, and host it at the domain “Amezon.com.”
