Amazon.com Scam: ChiekoLtd@gmail.com

Background:
As I was looking through various items on Amazon, I came across a very nice and expensive camera that was listed at $3,000 less than all other postings. The description said the camera was new and never used. The grammar and punctuation were terrible. The description concluded with specifying that all buyers should contact ChiekoLtd@gmail.com before ordering.

Seeing as how this is not normal Amazon behavior and in fact violates their policies, I decided to look up the company online (they appeared reputable and have been around for a while) and contact their support staff directly.

Their staff later responded saying that the listing was in fact due to their Amazon.com account being hacked. The company regained access to their Amazon account and removed the product.


Curiously I used a junk email to contact ChiekoLtd@gmail.com asking about the item and why it was listed with such a large discount. I got the following email in response:

Hello,
I will explain in this email all terms and condition
The [Item Listed] is BRAND NEW, never used, ( US model, not grey market),
but Amazon does not let us list it as new. The product is Sealed in its original box and comes with full Warranty,
receipt, all manufacturer supplied accessories...
The total price is $1,400.00 including all shipping taxes if you are in US and for international shipping you have to
pay extra 29,99 $ (outside US) .
If you want to buy, send me your phone number, full name, shipping address and I will contact Amazon asap to process
your order. Dispatch is by normal UPS Services, which takes 1-3 days depending on where in the US you are.
My return policy is full money back in 30 days.
For more information don't hesitate to contact me!
Many Thanks

As you may notice, the grammar and punctuation continue to be very unprofessional. The English is broken and they can't make up their minds how to write currency amounts. If this was a legitimate sale, Amazon would provide the information the company needed following the purchase through Amazon.com. They would not need to request it by email.

Last, the author if the email failed to provide any kind of professional footer. No name, no position, and no website.  Make sure you always keep purchase and communication within the sale platform! 

Read more »

Prescription Assistance Services: Is it a scam?

Background: 
In the mail recently, I received a letter and pharmacy discount cards for a company called Prescription Assistance Services. The letter spells out the terms of these cards as pre-activated, and no fee discount cards. We've seen something very similar before with RX Relief Pharmacy Discount Card / Healthcare Alliance.

My words of caution still hold true as I mentioned in the RX Relief Pharmacy Discount Card / Healthcare Alliance article, be weary of how your information is being used. Companies don't spend a lot of money marketing these for nothing.

Read more »

Email: Center Security (noreply@facebookalert.com) Scam

Scam Score: 85 (Severe Risk)

Background: While reviewing emails in my inbox, I came across an email that was intended to look like Facebook warning me that a charge had been made on my account for 22.34 USD.

The link provided for me to login to "Facebook" actually resolves to http://74.7.88.163/aboutes.php which is obviously not Facebook. This server also appears to be hosting the websites: websiteincomesuccess.com, www.leidschdagblad.nl, and www.tweetprocesor.com which are obviously not owned by Facebook and seem sketchy themselves.

This email fails our tests by first, not identifying me personally. If anyone knows my name, it is Facebook (or at least the name I provide them). Second, the grammar and punctuation in the email are not professional. Third, the email is supposed to be from Facebook but the message ends with a reference to PayPal Security. PayPal and Facebook are not the same company. Purchases notifications from PayPal will never be from a Facebook email.

Read more »

Net-Scams Scam Scores

New Scam Scores!

To quickly summarize the legitimacy of scam, we will now be supplying a Net-Scams Scam Score. This score builds on top of the existing rules we previously established and sums a score from those rules.

50 pts ~ Responsible Party

In all legit offers and giveaways, there will always a person or company held responsible for fulfillment of the prize. This company may or may not also handle inquires of possible participants. This responsible party must uphold their end of the agreement.

20 pts ~ Regulations and Tax Requirements

Do not account for US tax requirements and regulations

10 pts ~ Professional Conduct

Poor grammar used through out the site

10 pts ~ Server Location

Servers located outside the United States are not able to be governed by US law. This applies a sense of distrust.

10 pts ~ Other

This includes usage of Non-English languages in an English

Russian language used on the site

By adding points of each qualifying rule, we can derive a risk score of each potential scam:

 0 - 20 pts - Low risk

20 - 40 pts - Medium risk

40 - 60 pts - High risk

60 - 80 pts - Extreme risk

80 - 100 pts - Severe risk, extreme caution advised!

Read more »

Facebook: 2014 Chevrolet Camaro SS Scam

Scam Score: 80 (High risk)

With the progressing popularity of social website, there has also been an increase in social scams.

One such scam is this one:

2014 Chevrolet Camaro SS Facebook

This page fails to provide a responsible party who will be fulfilling the offer. In addition, they make no reference to regulations (i.e. excluded regions, etc.) or tax requirements. Prizes over $600 in value must be reported to the IRS for tax purposes (the winner will be required to pay taxes on the value car).

Read more »

Check.me Website Review

Recently, my dear mother went to pay a bill online to pay her internet bill and ended up on Check.me, a website that appears to pay your bills for you. Knowing that sometimes companies will intentionally redirect their eCommerce transactions to be handled by a third-party site, my mom completed their forms and supplied her credit card number. Afterward she realized that she may have made a mistake and asked me to find out more. With a little research in her browser history, I realized that she had clicked a link from a Google search page.

Looking at their cancellation policy and their BBB rating with 52 complaints in the last 12 months. I realized what this company was actually doing.

Their Game: 
This company makes their money on convenience fees and short cancellation windows. Their website is set up wizard style, where they guide you through the process one question as a time with each question asking for more and more sensitive information by asking you the billing number and then credit card information. Up until now, you don't know that they are going to want to charge you a convenience fee until the next screen which shows you the totals and payment methods. They will default select the "fastest" payment speed which costs a little more and then bill your card once you click to submit the order.

The Fine Print:
This company does not make it obvious that it is an independent third-party service not directly tied to the payee. In fact, you will only notice this if you read the fine print at the bottom of the web page or dig through pages on their website.

Cancellation Nightmare:
They don't want to refund your money so they make cancellation next-to-impossible. In fact if you don't cancel before 10:00 AM or 4:30 PM the same day (depending on the next time after completing the order), you can't cancel at all. They might say this is because your bill payment is being transacted and can't be halted, but I doubt the company has that quick of a turn-around time (hence why they have to payment speeds; neither one being same-day or next-day). With the situation with my mother, she tried to contact someone to cancel within that window and wasn't able to get a hold of anyone. I've encouraged her to talk with the credit card issuer about a reversal as they did not uphold their cancellation policy.

Honest Business? Sure, by somebody's standards...:
This site does not appear to be a scam or illegal, but I wouldn't call their practices ethical either. Just like with your bank or credit-union, it is a bill-pay service. They cut and mail the checks on your behalf and you pay a little more for it. And regardless of tactics, it is the user's responsibility to do their research when using any website including understanding their terms and conditions.

Read more »

Circumnews.com Scam (sontores.com or inqueritopro.com)

Overview
Today I learned of a web site called circumnews.com (server [46.28.65.179] also hosts sontores.com or inqueritopro.com which appear to be Russian and Portuguese versions of the same kind of thing). This site claims to pay you between $2 - $5 USD per article you read. There is no verification system to ensure users read the articles other than a (weak) bot protection system. They say that you must reach a minimum of $100 in order to get paid out and they will pay to a PayPal or Payza account. They claim that the site owners pay them and then they pay you 70% of what they make. Once you request your money, payments are supposed to be paid within 14 days. This has not been verified to actually happen.

A Potential Threat!
Personally, I have serious doubts about this kind of web site. Well it does not appear to be asking for more than your name (first and last), email, and your PayPal account, I speculate this is a system that provides them with a list of real PayPal (ecommerce)  accounts, emails, and possible passwords for those accounts if you use the same password for those accounts as you signed up with. In addition, providing your PayPal or Payza account information could put you at risk.

In addition, they also track referrals. This could provide them with a way to spam your email account as pretending to be someone you know since they know names and who referred who. They can also send you phishing emails pretending to be PayPal or Payza trying to get you to reveal additional important account information.

They also track IP addresses which can reveal more about you and the services you use (your general location, your Internet Service Provider).

Reasons for my distrust:
Don't provide company contact information
Servers hosted in Germany (or Ukraine)
Do not account for US tax requirements and regulations
Poor grammar used through out the site
Russian language used on the site
Fishy revenue model
The thought that Russians are going to pay you money to read English articles

Read more »