Spending a lot of time on the internet, a modern person gets most of their information from there, so they get acquainted with new:
- Services;
- Products;
- Brands.
The user receives advertisements based on their needs and search queries. Pop-up ads designed for internet resources are always bright and unusual. This is done to attract the user's attention. Most advertisements are plausible, but there are also false ads created by scammers.
Fraudulent Ads
Fraudulent ads that appear or aggressively pop up on sites attract the user's attention against their will. Mostly, these are ads with bright and loud titles offering to:
- purchase a product;
- use a service;
- participate in a promotion;
- get a discount card;
- become one of the few participants.
Fraudulent advertising is mostly aggressive, requiring an immediate click on the link to receive a limited-time offer, with no time to make a decision—it must be done now and urgently. Usually, such ads have links that lead to a site. The consequences could be malicious software infecting the computer, reading information, or directing to an application or site where personal data must be entered to participate in a promotion. This should not be done because these sites are fraudulent and designed to collect personal information about users so that scammers can use it in their schemes.
False Advertising
Scammers can operate under the guise of well-known brands, copying the sites of famous companies, their logos, with minor changes in appearance, offering users false advertising.
Under the guise of well-known companies, scammers:
- collect personal data;
- steal banking information;
- sell non-existent goods;
- provide fake services.
Equally false is advertising created with the help of artificial intelligence, very often commercials with celebrities talking about huge earnings on trading platforms or cryptocurrency exchanges, and urging participation in this program, are fake. Believing such ads, users may purchase offered courses on earning with cryptocurrency, which in most cases do not provide complete information about trading platforms. Or it happens that the courses do not exist at all, scammers collect money for their payment and then disappear, and the victims do not even suspect that they have become participants in a financial pyramid using false advertising.
Financial Scam
The great imagination of scammers is enviable, as they constantly devise various schemes to earn money through deception.
Scammers love to deceive people by creating fake information, for example, they can post ads for real estate sales. The scheme is to attract as many buyers as possible and sell them non-existent real estate. Mostly, aggressive advertising is sent out with offers to immediately purchase real estate from the ad at a promotional price, and the promotion time is limited. Thus, attracting buyers, scammers require a prepayment, promising the victim that they will be the only buyer of this property. By collecting prepayments from some buyers, scammers, of course, sell nothing, but close ads and cut all ties to start a new scam on another online resource.
Another common financial scam scheme is charity. Scammers use this method to collect donations from caring people for various charitable purposes. Of course, not all charitable collections are fraudulent, but this scheme is very attractive to scammers. With knowledge of social engineering and human psychology, scammers easily manipulate people and play on their feelings, creating fake charitable organizations to attract the maximum number of investors.
User Protection
To avoid becoming a victim of false promises and fake advertising on the internet, you need to:
- be cautious with bright ads popping up on websites;
- avoid clicking on unknown links;
- enter personal data in dubious applications;
- disclose information about financial and banking operations;
- keep access codes and passwords to social networks, websites, and applications secret;
- filter information received in messages;
- set up additional two-factor authentication for applications, especially banking;
- not trust little-known people on the internet, especially if they talk about money.
Be careful when choosing advertisements, study them, and request additional information from the advertiser when questions arise. Do not immediately believe everything you see in ads on websites.