Don't let online shopping scams ruin holiday cheer

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Illustration by Michael R. Schmidt and Brian Delaney~Sun-Times Media

Updated: April 19, 2011 5:21AM

Holiday shopping online is a double-edged sword. There’s nothing more convenient than ordering gifts online and having them delivered to your door, wrapped, even.

But shopping online can be precarious. Cyber shoppers must keep their wits about them, especially during the holiday season.

The Better Business Bureau cited a statistic from the National Retail Federation about the 2009 holiday shopping season that said 96.5 million Americans shopped online during Cyber Monday while 79 million Americans shopped at brick-and-mortar retailers on Black Friday.

“While the rest of us are pulling the decorations out of the attic, scammers are blowing the dust off of their tried-and-true holiday scams,” said Steve J. Bernas, president and CEO of the Better Business Bureau serving Chicago and Northern Illinois, in a press release. “We can all help make these holiday scams a ghost of Christmas’ past by not falling for them anymore.”

Safe shopping rules

Rule No. 1 of safe shopping: if it’s too good to be true, it probably is.

Websites that offer unbelievable prices for luxury items or hard-to-find toys after they sell out at national chain stores may not be legit, the BBB says.

Check the business out with the BBB, and never wire money to a seller, the agency recommends. Shop locally and in person to ensure you’re getting what you pay for.

Other scammers may try to lure you into their Internet traps with phishing e-mail, which poses as e-mail from a trusted source such as the United Parcel Service or FedEx and includes a link or an attachment.

Don’t click the link or open the attachment until you confirm they are safe, authorities warn.

Check for e-mail or website addresses that don’t match up, typos and grammar errors, which are common red flags of a phishing e-mail.

E-mail popping up in your inbox from a company you have never dealt with is also suspicious.

Online crime fighting

The FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center recommends the same precautions, and then some.

Scammers have been known to conduct fraudulent auction sales, reship merchandise purchased with stolen credit cards and sell fraudulent or stolen gift cards through auction sites at discounted prices.

Don’t fill out forms seeking personal information that are sent through e-mail. Any e-mail that urges you to act quickly or claims there is an emergency may be a scam, the FBI reports.

Besides contacting the bank directly to verify the e-mail, the FBI suggests reporting scam e-mail to the Internet Crime Complaint Center, www.IC3.gov.

The website scambusters.org backs up the FBI warning on gift cards, reporting that gift cards sold on auction sites are quite often frauds — either they are stolen, used or counterfeit or they aren’t worth the amount of money they’re advertised at. It’s safer to buy gift cards directly from the merchant.

Also, never give anyone your social security number, date of birth, or other personal information when buying a gift card. A legit seller would not ask for it.

Brick-and-mortar shoppers aren’t immune from scams either, and identity theft is a big one.

Don’t lose track of your wallet while you’re hauling your shopping bags. Keep your credit and debit cards close and cover up the keypad when you punch in your PIN at the cash machine, the BBB suggests.

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