Date First Published: 1st July 2023
Topic: Cybersecurity
Subtopic: Threats To Individuals
Article Type: Computer Questions & Answers
Difficulty: EasyDifficulty Level: 3/10
Learn about how to spot money making scams in this article.
Money-making scams, also known as 'make money online' scams or 'work at home' scams claim to give a large amount of money for one thing, but don't actually do what they claimed and mislead users of their true intent. Money-making scams disguise themselves as legitimate platforms where you can make money online when they are actually fake and designed to deceive other people. This is because the most important goal to the creator is to lure people in so that they can get as many people as possible to sign up so that they can collect their data. This is often so that they can sell it to third parties. Below are 10 ways to spot money-making scams online and fake money-making sites.
When you see a site that promises that you can make money, you should assess whether the tasks sound too simple to be making money from them. For example, does it promise a large amount of money for very simple tasks, like filling out data in web forms or forwarding emails? It is unlikely that someone would give someone money just because they filled out a form or forwarded an email. It would cost them a lot of money with no clear way of getting that money back. There are scammers out there that will claim to give a lot of money for very simple tasks, but never actually give it, just so they can collect your data.
Another thing that you should check is if the site provides much information about what you will be doing to make money online. If it is vague, only contains a few sentences and nothing else, has no knowledge base, or only displays a sign up form and no other information about what you will be doing, that is an immediate sign that it is a scam.
Fake money making sites are often vague and don't provide much information about what you will be doing to reduce the chances of people detecting that it is a scam. Detailed information is also something that scam sites would not usually bother with and is a sign that it has been rushed to be launched. A legitimate money making site will explain in detail what you will be doing and how you will make money.
You should check that you have a way of contacting the site admins before deciding to trust a money-making site. You can usually find a contact page which will display contact details or a form you can fill out to send them a message. If you can't find any way to contact the site admins or get in touch with them, that is an immediate sign that it is a scam.
Take a look at the content of the money making site. If you notice a large number of spelling and grammatical errors on the website or awkward phrasing, it is more likely to be a scam. This is because lots of mistakes suggest that it has been rushed by someone without them properly proofreading their work.
There are some review sites where users can share what they think of another site, the quality of a product, and whether the site is legitimate. Trustpilot and ScamAdviser are examples of well-known review sites. To do this, search for the name of the money making site online and see if any review pages come up. It is important to look for reviews online before signing up for websites, especially websites that allow you to make money. But, be careful when looking at the reviews. If they all look the same, are all posted within a very short time span, are vague and do not go into much detail, or contain lots of spelling and grammatical errors, then they might be fake.
This method of spotting a money making scam might not always work as there might not be any reviews on Trustpilot or other review sites, especially if the website has been recently launched.
Another thing that you should is consider is whether it is a "get rich quick" scheme that claims that you can make a huge amount of money very quickly. For example, does it sound too good to be true and say that you can make hundreds of pounds in just a few minutes of work? Making money online very often takes time and you should be wary of any money making site that claims things like this in such a short amount of time.
If you see an opportunity to make money online only being offered for a limited amount of time, it is more likely to be a scam. Especially if you see a timer counting down the days, hours, minutes, and seconds you have until the offer expires, this indicates that it has a sense of urgency to get people to hurry to sign up with their information before it is no longer available. If you see a countdown clock or timer, try clearing your cookies and reloading the page. If you notice that the clock has reset, then that is an immediate sign that it is a scam.
The reason why this indicates that it is more likely to be a scam is that scammers often want you to quickly make a decision to sign up without thinking about it properly. They want you to sign up as soon as possible before you complete your research and find out that it is a scam. However, this could also mean that the offer is only available for a limited amount of time and there is genuinely a limited number of positions, so don't rely on time limits itself to spot a money-making scam online.
A money-making site has a good reason to ask for your contact information, like your email address, first name, surname, and your physical address so that they can send you notifications, invoices, and payments in your name. However, they have no good reason to ask for your card number if they are only paying you and it does not require you to pay them. If they are asking for more personal information than necessary, then it is more likely to be a scam. This suggests that their goal is to get hold of your details and collect your data.
The domain age is how long the domain name has been registered. Checking the domain age is useful as it helps give an idea of whether the website has been running for a good amount of time. Scam sites often have a very young domain age as they are put up early and rarely stay up for long periods of time because people start posting negative reviews and they get negative feedback on social media, leading to visitors staying away from the website. Finding out the domain age of a website is easy. You can perform a WHOIS lookup, which will tell you how long the website has been active.
You should consider whether you have received the offer through an unsolicited message. For example, if you got an unsolicited email or text message saying that you can make money online with a link to the site, it is more likely to be a scam. Scammers often send their text messages and emails to large numbers of recipients at once who haven't opted in to receive them. They may use a bot to capture phone numbers and email addresses and then add them to the spam list so that they can send messages to thousands of people a minute.
If so, it is important that you tell me as soon as possible on this page.
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