Date First Published: 1st July 2023
Topic: Cybersecurity
Subtopic: Threats To Systems, Data & Information
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 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, but they are 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 and fake money-making platforms online.
When you see a platform 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 watching videos or forwarding emails? It is unlikely that someone would give someone money just because they watched a video or forwarded an email. It would cost them a lot of money with no clear way of getting that money back. There are scammers 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.
The most important thing you should check is if the platform provides much information about what you will be doing to make money. If there is very little information about what you will be doing or only displays a sign up form and no other information, it is most likely a scam.
Detailed information is 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 platform 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. 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 get in touch with them, it is most likely a scam.
Take a look at the content of the money making site. If you notice a lot of spelling mistakes 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 looking over their work.
There are some review sites where users can share what they think of another site and whether the site is legitimate, like Trustpilot and ScamAdviser. To do this, search for the name of the money making platform 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.
This method of spotting money making scams will not always work as there might not be any reviews on Trustpilot or other review sites, especially if the platform has been very 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 platform 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 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, it is likely a scam.
The reason why this indicates that it is more likely to be a scam is that scammers want you to quickly decide 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's 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 money-making scams online.
A money-making platform 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 collect your data.
The domain age is how long the domain name has been registered. Checking the domain age is useful as it gives 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. To find out the domain age of a website, 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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