7 Tips for Finding Scams In 2021

With almost all transactions these days going digital, scammers have found a greater opportunity to initiate fraud. The limited face-to-face transactions due to the pandemic have made everything even better for these fraudsters.

In these challenging times when you’d rather pinch pennies and keep your money safe, it pays to be vigilant. That’s because scammers are using all channels to fool individuals into providing their personal and financial information.

Think one step ahead of these scammers and suspect fraud if you experience any of the following:

Fake Calls  

Because of limited transactions due to COVID-19, you may receive a call from a person pretending to be from a legitimate government agency or a private company. Be wary of the following tactics from scammers asking you to:   

  • Validate your information: This person may ask you for your Social Security number and other sensitive data for verification purposes. The SSA has issued a warning about this modus operandi, saying they will never ask you to verify or confirm your number. In most cases, some scammers have really sophisticated tools that the numbers of government agencies appear in your caller ID.     
  • Enroll in ‘make money online courses: Because of ongoing economic challenges, some scammers take advantage of the situation by offering get-rich-quick schemes. Look for online reviews of these courses to make sure it’s not a scam. Here’s an example of a thorough review for one of the many ‘make money online’ offers: https://www.scamrisk.com/inbound-closer/
  • Pay in order to claim your prize: In some cases, a scammer will provide you with offers, where, in order to qualify, you’d have to pay via credit card.
  • Pay so you don’t get arrested: Fraudsters will pretend they’re from a government agency who found out that you owe the government some fines or taxes. If you ignore the warning, you’re threatened with deportation, arrest, or a lawsuit. In reality, law enforcers don’t call you and threaten you over the phone.    
  • Avail of debt restructuring: Some scammers try to convince you to reduce your debts by pretending to be from a legitimate agency that can make things happen—with a fee.
  • Invest in a business: Other imposters offer investment and business opportunities with high returns. Don’t fall for this trick and keep your money. 

Phishing

Phishing is an online scamming technique that predominantly uses email and text messages from a representative of a legitimate institution. The goals remained the same: to lure unsuspecting victims into providing their sensitive data that leads to either identity theft or financial filching.  

Scammers in 2021 continue to employ a horde of tactics enough to fill the pages of a book. In fact, their cyberattacks occur numerous times on a daily basis. It so pervasive that the Internet Crime Complaint Center of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) notes up to USD$57 million is lost due to phishing in a year. 

scammers

These, however, are the most common tactics used:  

  • An official-looking email that says they’ve noticed suspicious activity.
  • A message claiming you have problems in your account and asking you to click a link or download an attachment to fix the problem.
  • Scammers sending you a fake invoice and asking you to click the link or attachment for payment. 
  • An email asking you to pay in order to claim a lottery prize.    
  • A message saying you’re qualified for a government tax rebate and other programs. 
  • The email asks you to click a link where you should update your financial information.

Boosting your cybersecurity is important in filtering the mails you receive and protects your gadgets from hackers.

While the email, text messages, or phone calls may bear all the information expected from legitimate entities, staying safe means keeping these things in mind:

  1. Observe the caller’s demeanor. If the other person on the line sounds threatening, desperate, or pressures you into making decisions or paying as soon as possible, it’s even more necessary to not let your guard down. 
  2. Apart from asking you to pay via credit card, these imposters will ask you to wire your money or reload a prepaid or cash card. Never fall into this money trap.    
  3. Some scammers may use the names of legitimate companies in their fraudulent activities. In order to confirm the legitimacy of such claims, try running the company’s name through a website, for instance, https://www.scamrisk.com/palm-beach-confidential/.
  4. If the message is sent from a public domain instead of the company name, it’s probably fake. 
  5. Check the message for misspelled words and grammar mistakes. Most fraudsters don’t concentrate on the quality of the message but rather the quantity or the number of persons who’ll receive the scam letter.    
  6. Generic greetings, such as ‘Dear Mam/Sir’ may be a telltale sign of a scammer’s letter, too. If it were from a company, they’d have a more personal approach.  
  7. Suspicious links that don’t match the sender’s address. If your look at the links you’re asked to click, you’ll probably realize that it’s fake.

Final Thoughts 

Cybercriminals continue to make victims out of unsuspecting people on a regular basis because they’re quick to adapt to the changes in cybersecurity. While there’s no full guarantee that you won’t be targeted, don’t ever make the mistake of providing your personal information, username, passwords, and personal identification number, to anyone.