Got Scammed, details in message

[tiredtoo]

Well friends, I got scammed yesterday or the day before. Got an email supposedly from Ace Hardware. Answer survey and get free gift. Did so and ordered free air purifier, shipping cost $7.Paid with Credit card. Today I get a charge of $49.95 on card. Seems i didn't read the fine print and accepting "free" gift put me on some kind of monthly payment program. With help from fraud alert I got it cleared and stopped the scam.
BEWARE my friends, beware!

[Xipe Totec]

1. I have a gmail filter that triggers on the words "free gift" and automatically sends mail to spam.

[Demovictory9]

2. I'm glad you got your money back.

[Mr.Bill]

3. I recieved an Email months ago

that asked me to amswer a survey about Kohl's department store. I was told I would recieve a gift worth "up to" $10,000. I had no illusion I would win that, but get some gift of lower value. They let me choose from a list of things and I selected a LED flashlight valued at $50. I only had to pay shipping and handling of $5.95. A week or so later, I got that flashlight which I estimate to be worth about...$5.95. I have no doubt they made a few bucks on the deal. I actually like the flashlight, it's made out of metal, pretty powerful and very small which is convenient for some household applications.

I guess if they get enough responders like me, they are making some money.

[SCantiGOP]

6. Another possibility

They may be happy to break even on the gift. What is worth more is that they can sell your contact info as someone who has in the past been willing to respond to email offers.

[Mr.Bill]

7. I'm sure you are absolutely correct.

This is evident in the Emails I have gotten since with similar offers.

[SCantiGOP]

8. A favorite cartoon

From the old days when scams had to come through the US Mail:
A hot dog reading a letter while standing at his mailbox; it says: “You may already be a wiener.”

[reACTIONary]

28. That was a favorite catch phrase...

... of an old friend of mine.

[jrthin]

4. Make sure they do not keep billing your credit card monthly.

That is part of the same scam.

[iluvtennis]

16. + agree. And if you can use PayPal or Venmo or etc so your credit card info isn't in the ether. n/t

[tiredtoo]

31. My fraud alert gave me directions on how to do that. thanks. eom

[lamp_shade]

5. Lowe's, Kohl's, others. I get them fairly often. I look first at the sender's address.

... which always look extremely suspicious. I send them to SPAM before even opening.

[SCantiGOP]

9. Smart. I had an email the other day

that said it was from Koals Department Store.

[blueinredohio]

10. Have you ever heard the saying

"You never get something for nothing?"

[tiredtoo]

32. Economics class professor said.

There ain't no free lunch.

[SWBTATTReg]

11. Nothing is ever free. Nothing. All of us should never ever respond to any emails stating that...

something will be free, and to boot, answer some questions on a survey (and forevermore, receive thousands of junk emails later).

Glad you got your funds back, w/ your fraud alert. Good for you!

[CMYK]

20. But But But.....

Facebook is free...

If something is free, then it's not the product - you are.
Did you get that???

You are Facebook's product. They sell your data. Over and over.
Your interests, your hobbies, your families....You. Are. The. Product.

[SWBTATTReg]

21. I don't have FB and if it's free, so what?

[CMYK]

22. sorry

I didn't mean you specifically. I was hijacking your line 'Nothing is ever free', agreeing and adding my two cents

[SWBTATTReg]

29. Sorry, I was kind of hoping that I didn't misunderstand you (and I did!). I am sorry that I

misunderstood you and also, I wish you the best for the New Year! Take care...

And ... you are so right, that's probably one of the reasons I'm not on FB, don't get me wrong, a lot of people do use FB to keep in touch etc., and that's okay. I (IMHO) just don't like 'big brother/FB' overlooking all of us.

[kimbutgar]

12. I got an email from Amazon today saying there was unusual activity on my account

And instructed me to log in on the link they priovided. Nothing else was in the email like the Amazon company address. I put the email into spam and then went to my Amazon account, there was no problem with my account.

I’ve learned if something sounds to good to be true it’s usually fraudulent. I brought a time share years ago that I was never able to use because I had to book 6 months in advance. My hubby works for an airline and we fly standby when the flights are open and usually don’t plan a trip until 2 weeks before. I was out a big chunk of money but I learned my lesson.

[leftieNanner]

13. I Got a Trojan Horse email this morning

Ostensibly from someone at church.

Opened it. Said a few swear words. Went in and changed my password.

Damn. You'd think I would be smart enough to not click on that stuff by now.

[keithbvadu2]

14. I get bunches of those 'survey' offers of free gift cards.

I get bunches of those 'survey' offers of free gift cards.

Like the Post Office is going to send a gift card.

Especially McAffee and Norton.

An earlier poster said their real purpose is to bombard you with crap and then you hit the 'unsubscribe' button and get a virus in return.

Best to just delete and not reply in any manner.

Even an 'unsubscribe' shows you to be a live fish.

[Shermann]

15. Had a bogus charge from Spotify on my credit card last week

It's been a while since I had one of these fraudulent charges. I have had no dealings with Spotify. The bank couldn't tell me anything to help identify the data leak (they never help in this regard). I haven't set up any new accounts online recently, and the few in-person purchases I've made used the chip. I cancelled the card and waited for a new one. I've been refunded, but it's still frustrating.

[cayugafalls]

17. Never click a link in an email offering free anything. Period. There is no free anything.

It is always a scam of some kind.

One click and you end up paying, either with money or a virus/malware.

I work in computer support. We can't stress this one enough.

Never click email links. Period.

[Iggo]

18. Candy from strangers. We all slip once or thrice.

[JHB]

19. Also check whether it was actually Ace Hardware, or someone else using their name & logo as lures

[JohnnyRingo]

23. Air purifier of the month club.

I'm sure what they're doing is legal, and that's why you got your money back, but how many just make the payments or don't notice?

[IbogaProject]

24. Only free if you do not have to pay anything

Its Only free if you do not have to pay anything.

[IbogaProject]

25. Don't feel bad I got scammed this year

Don't feel bad I got scammed this year for my first time ever where I didn't start the interaction. I fell for a domain renewal scam.

[SeattleVet]

26. I try to check in with the actual companies the spam is allegedly from...

and report the scammers to them.

I get a ton of the 'free $90 gift card' to fill out a 'survey' (always $90 for some reason), 'Amazon' account locked, and 'PayPal' account locked spam. Before deleting them I forward them to the appropriate entities. The companies will have info about where to send these (for example there's '[e-mail]'). This helps them track and possibly take action against the scammers, and gives them more information to help them warn their actual customers about the scams.

NEVER click on a link provided in an email. Always type in the URL yourself (or use your own bookmarks) and go directly to the site.

Glad you were able to get this one cleared up, but, unfortunately, by falling for this one your info is probably now being sold as a package of 'sucker lists' to every other scammer out there. Expect a lot more garbage in your inbox.

(Not sure how many folks here are old enough to remember the old UseNet group, news.admin.net-abuse.email. I was REAL active there for several years, hunting down and getting email spammer accounts and domains shut down. We had a lot of fun taking down the likes of "Terry Tickle" and Sanford "The Spam King" Wallace. Now most of these are coming from out of the country, and much harder to track down and eliminate...especially the email and phone scammers in India. Every so often you'll see a story about one of those call centers getting busted, with photos of smiling cops and the arrested scammers. In many of these cases the arrest is pretty much the end of the story, as the police are being paid off and nothing happens to the criminals. Many are back in business later the same day.)

[soldierant]

27. I have answered surveys in the past through two companies

which gave you points for each survey successfully completed, and you could redeem the points for cash when you had accumulated enough - or for merchandise, but I always selected cash through PayPal. You weren't allowed to take just any survey you selected - if the screening indicated you didn't know enough about the topic to actually contribute, you were bumped. I got bumped a lot, so I didn't make a lot ... but ​over time it could add up.

Both went out of business. I'm sure that's because they only sold actual data, not personal info, because I never received any spam which was likely to as a result of my participation. I no longer take any "surveys" for anyone. Especially those which answer themselves. "Disingenuous" is the nicest thing I can say about them.

[msfiddlestix]

30. That happened to me back in August. I knew it the second I hit "send" button

I got hit with a number of odd charges but it was a debit card and not a credit card, so there was much more involved with paperwork in stopping and reimbursements, My fault, big lesson learned, it was email like you describe only it was named "Lowes" offering similar deal.

Last week I had an issue with an unauthorized charge on my credit card from a hotel I stayed in Virginia last summer. That charge was only $1. But I think that was a sort of "test key" dry run. I almost missed it on my statement it was so low, but when I spotted the hotel name, I knew something was wrong.

At the end of the day, immediately call the credit card company or bank fraud line and they're great about handling things immediately.

Inconvenienced a little with deactivating cards attached to monthly payments, but it's better than risking getting cleaned out.

[Totally Tunsie]

33. Surveys can be so dangerous!

It's a cheap, easy way for scammers to gather information about you that can possibly be used to determine your personal passwords Especially be wary of surveys that ask for your personal information (birthdate, income level, number of children, pets) or your personal preferences, such as in food, or musical genre, cars, etc. It's amazing how much can be gleaned from seemingly innocent questions, leaving yourself wide open to hacking.

Even if the survey is from what you consider a trusted source, you never know just where that survey and its information will end up. Info is bought and sold all the time.