You are aware of scammers who scam people into doing something they would never want to do consciously or willingly if they knew what was going on. And that is the topic of today. Scammers. More specifically, we are going to talk about internet related scams or scammers who abuse the freedom of Internet.

So, who are these people?

These are really disturbed people. They do not have any college degrees. They are desperate to make a living but do not know anything related to real hard work but they work hard. If I say that they are entrepreneurs but on the wrong side of the spectrum, I won’t be wrong. These people can come from anywhere around the world; from Brazil to Japan, Alaska to Australia. Scammers can be found anywhere and everywhere. They are emotionally disturbed people to the degree that they do not care about others.

What do they get from scamming people? Why do they do it?

They get the satisfaction of success and money. No, really. They do get it.
The major number of scammers comes from under-developed countries or developing countries from regions like Africa, Asia, Asia Pacific Regions, South and Central America, and Central and Eastern Europe. From these regions South Asia dominants the market of scamming on internet. Even Nigeria the world capital of internet scams, cannot beat these people. They are everywhere on internet. They are the major business for domain providers, which later are used for scamming.

What are different types of scams? And finally How do they carry it out?

Although there are so many numbers of different scams carried out by these people, that most of us do not even know. But the most major types of scams that are being pulled around the world are as follows:

Tech Scam

Tech scams are so widely spread that even some big IT companies practice them even in USA. USA is biggest income source of this type of scam. The target age for this scam is 35 or more. Reason? Because, by this age most people are having families, stay at home mothers are extremely busy with their toddlers, and fathers are mostly at work. So, during the free time, women will surf the internet and mistakenly go to some website which shows them a number and says that their computer is crashed. Call it to get it fixed immediately. During the call, scammers convince the victims into either giving their credit card details or buying an insurance on software which doesn’t exist.

IRS Scam

I have never been victim of this scam as I am not in USA where it is targeted most.  So, I had to dig on internet to find out more about this scam and how it is carried out. Most scammers in this category are upgraded from Tech Scams since all these scams are curated by same organizations around the world. They use the numbers they received using tech scams and call the victims that they are liable to IRS for xxxx amount and ask them to call back.

In their naivety, people call back and again are convinced into paying hundreds of dollars per month to scammer thinking they are paying their dues to IRS.

Social Media Scams

I have never been on any side of spectrum of above mentioned two scams. But I have been on both side of spectrum of this category. Most of scams in this category are carried out on Facebook. But there is one particular that may save my readers in future from being scammed because I was both sides of spectrum of this particular scam. It is commonly known as stealing Facebook Page.

How does it work?

What scammers do is they make hundreds of fake Facebook Accounts/IDs and create a wide range of mutual friends. Then they message all the possible pages they can find on Facebook saying that they are marketers/promoter and want to promote on their page/s and will pay $$$$ amount per week. Now this is a very grey area. Because most promoters actually approach pages like this to promote their pages or brand and are honest. Although, not according to Facebook policies. Anyway, When Page admins contact them, they ask them to create a business account and work with them using tools of Facebook. When user is on Facebook Business, and have added their pages on Facebook Business, they ask them to add them as Admin -> Advertiser. Which essentially means that they are admin of their business account. And in just few seconds, scammers remove them as admin of their Business account and their pages. And in just 2 minutes of signing up on business account people lose their Facebook pages with hundreds of thousands of likes. One such page which was scammed by a person in India contained 28 Million Likes.

What do scammers do with pages?

Now what do they get from this. These pages are either used to make money by scammers or sold to big marketing/promotion companies for a hefty price ranging from thousands of dollars to tens of thousands of dollars depending on the page insights. And companies willingly pay. These companies can be from anywhere in the world. Most buyers of such stolen pages come from Europe, Australia, America and India. This is why you see a new brand suddenly appearing on Facebook with hundreds of thousands of Likes on their Facebook Page. This is a complete set of economy that works totally on scam. Now, how do they use themselves to make money? It is simple, they use affiliate links on pages to make money. And highest margin provider for these affiliated links is littlethings
Either way, these scammers make thousands of dollars by scamming people using this category of scams. Mind you that your Instagram is also victim of this as well. So is your Instant Articles account.

Does Facebook know about this?

Yes, Facebook is aware of this type of scam going on. Then you might think why Facebook is not doing anything to solve problem. Well, its is again grey here. You see Facebook makes money when you create an advertisement on Facebook. And you can only create advertisement on Facebook only for your Page. If your page is stolen, and you do not get your page back, what will you do? Create a new Facebook Page, invest on it again but with more conscious mind from Scammers than Facebook. Facebook doesn’t put any explicit effort on saving your Page. They own entire data of Facebook and makes a fool out of you with various reasons like they cannot verify if it is your page.

How to save yourself from these scammers?

It is simple. Do not give anyone your business account admin rights. Because Facebook has also created employee feature on business account where you can give specific page admin rights than business account admin rights. Which scammers want you to have.

Conclusion

Do not get scammed. Always make sure that you are not dealing with a scammer. A scammer is always in defensive position. Take advantage of that and identify him. A scammer will always want you to do something quick and fast. Ask them to wait for a day or two and do some research on your own. Do not come into greed if you are on Facebook. And share this as much as possible so that people can be saved from scammers.