Internet scams use email, websites, and other methods to deceive people into giving money or personal information. To avoid being scammed, learn about common scams, recognize signs of a scam, and use tools like antivirus software and anti-phishing toolbars.
A scam is a conspiracy to scam or defraud people into earning money or other valuables by deceiving them in some way. An Internet scam is a scam that uses the Internet, involving email messages, websites, or some combination in executing the scam. Other methods of communication may also be used, including telephone calls, text messages and snail mail. There are several approaches to help you as you use the internet and try to detect and avoid being trapped by an internet scam.
The first way to be able to detect an Internet scam is to familiarize yourself with the long-standing Internet scams that continue to plague people. These include the Nigerian scam, also known as the 419 scam, as this is the particular section of the Penal Code in Nigeria that deals with fraud. In this scam, an email request from someone claiming to be a high-ranking official in Nigeria requests the recipient’s help in depositing funds that have been overpaid by the Nigerian government. Another well-known Internet scam of which there are many variations is the kind where you receive an email telling you that you have won a lottery. Other frequently encountered scams involve working from home, government grants, lotteries and debt assistance.
You can also detect an Internet scam by learning to recognize the signs of a scam. Spoof websites and email scams can often be recognized by spelling mistakes, grammatical errors, use of all caps, and other non-standard language. Any email asking you for a password, account number, or Social Security number is in all likelihood a scam — legitimate companies don’t ask you to put your valuable personal information at risk by putting it in an email. Also beware of fake seals and logos. When in doubt, independently type in the correct website for a business entity, i.e. don’t click an email link, and compare logos.
The third way to detect an Internet scam is to know and use practices and tools that can help protect you. For example, you can use a browser that has a phishing filter and clearly identifies safe sites. Use antivirus, malware detection, and antispyware software for help filtering out scams. An anti-phishing toolbar, which checks web addresses against databases of known scam sites and verifies the use of Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificates and warns the user when it detects inconsistencies or problems, is another tool to help in detecting Internet hoaxes.
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