10 Measures To Avert Social Media Shopping Scams

1. Averting Social Media Shopping Scam 2.  8 Elements Of Frugality 3.  Scam-Proof Your Trust 4.  Trashing Leading Scam Questions 5.  Averting Scam SMS 6. Preventing Identify Theft

Are you familiar with the scam risks of making purchases on social media platforms?

More specifically, have you been buying things listed on online storefronts without taking precautions?

Whether or not you have been doing so, this article is for you.

In this edition of "Smart Spending: Don't Get Scammed" , let's focus on what you shouldn't do while shopping online or on social media.

The clear objective here is to protect yourself and safeguard your finances.

Track the discussion here:

• What Is Social Media Shopping?
• The Features
• Why People Do It 
• The Disadvantages
• How Scammers Exploit It
• Steps To Avert Being Scammed

What Is Social Media Shopping?

To get us started, let's first understand that buying from social media shops requires much caution, prudence, vigilance, and security consciousness, in order to prevent subjecting yourself to scam activities.

We need to emphasize that this practice constitutes one of the commonest means by which consumers become victims of online fraud.

To simplify, it can lure innocent shoppers  to fall into retail and data scam traps.

To get a proper handle on the subject, it's necessary to ask this question:

What exactly does social media shopping mean?

In traditional parlance social media shopping

is a type of e-commerce known as "Social commerce" .

It involves using  social media networks as  business outlets, from which retailers exhibit their products directly to consumers, who in turn get to discover and purchase from sellers.

These activities are usually effected through any or all of the following channels:

• online storefronts

• product listing advertised via pop-up ads 

• sponsored posts on such platforms like Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, or X.

A major red flag that's  embedded in this type of buying is that some social media storefronts  can hardly be physically confirmed or identified outside their online premise or presence.

What this implies is that you may likely find it most difficult, if not impossible, to trace them to any visible  legitimate offline  presence or on-the-ground location.

Common Features Of Social Media-Based Purchase

What are the usual appearances of this type of activity?

Let's endeavour now to identify the typical characteristics of such transactions.

1. Visual-Centric Presentation Method:

They may present products in attention-seeking manner by displaying them in  high-quality photos formats, or using short and engaging videos to quickly grab your interest.

2. Ready-Made Discovery

You don't need to search for them. The products spring up on you as sponsored ads directly inside your social feed and inviting instantaneous action from you.

3. Shows Checkout With Direct Link

Typically, you are likely to find buttons such as "Shop Now" or "Learn More" - which link you directly to the product pages or storefronts.

These can also be single-product landing pages, which are typically simplified for ease of operations.

4. Showing Inadequate Product Information

They often offer limited descriptions about the products.

Rather than providing detailed specifications or materials on it, they would tend to elaborate more on the emotional benefits and the need for urgent action (i.e. buying) to avoid losing the offer.

5.  Providing Simplified Payment Methods

It's a common thing to find that the methods of paying for the product has been highly made easy.

The checkout is usually streamlined and features popular payment means like credit card, PayPal,  digital wallets, etc.

6. Leveraging FOMO

Consumers' Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) is also frequently and strongly exploited.

This is done by lacing interactions with "flash sale" and "limited stock" notices and countdown timers.

7. Displaying Social Proof Elements

containing manipulated ads, fake or bought likes, shares, or comments, etc.

8.  Hidden Customer Service:

It usually lacks actual contact details including physical office addresses, visible phone numbers, etc.

Instead, it waxes strong on Direct Messaging (DM) and generic email address as a mode of contact.

9.  Offering Free or Low-Cost Shipping

It dangles before your eyes products with free or cheap shipping, with a view to encourage you to pay for them without delay.

10.  Perfunctory Vetting

Finally, exclusive focus is devoted to ensuring that your payment method is effective.

Contrarily, the platform could totally ignore or only perfunctorily concern itself with verifying if the seller or product is legitimate.

Common Reasons Why People Buy From Social Media Storefronts

A lot of people to indulge in this practice due to a number of factors.

Here are some of the most outstanding motivations, emotions and circumstances:

1. Trending and Novelty Appeal:

They are regarded as trending.

Customers view them as offering new, unique or viral  products which are not yet available on major retail sites.

2. Discounts

Everybody responds favourably to anything that lowers the cost of of what they are buying.

In this regard, any promise or indication of enjoying discounts will move them to line up for most products.

Bottom line: any pricing that they feel is too good to be true is always a great attraction.

3.  Strong Desires And Irresistible Impulse

are equally compelling motivations here.

There's only a very thin line between sighting (in storefronts) items you so desperately desire to have  and grabbing them as fast as you can.

As long they have the means, most people may find it virtually impossible to resist the urge to make such purchases.

4.  Boredom

At times, for some guys, the trigger is boredom.

They find themselves browsing social media feeds looking for escape.

To such characters, anything they come across that obviously provides entertainment or relief from stress, is good enough to pay for.

5.  Misplaced Trust

Sometimes people make mistaken assumptions by thinking that once a platform is trustworthy, any company that  advertises on it is also reliable and legit.

As it turns out, that's  not always true in most cases.

6.  Validation Needs

Peer influence on social media is another formidable trigger.

To some persons, to  join friends or influencers to interact with similar ads or storefronts is a good way to gain a sense of peer validation.

7. Again, the attraction could also be the Visual Appeal or Packaging of the product.

This includes the impact of its  powerful, high-quality visuals and videos that effectively demonstrate what it (supposedly) does and how desirable it is.

8.   Moreover, convenience plays its own role here too.

The crux of the matter is that shoppers love the fact that they don't have to search in many places or sites for what they want.

After all, the storefronts bring the desired products to them all in one place.

That's one powerful  magnet right there.

9.  Impatience And Gratification

Furthermore, the desire to gain instant gratification can sometimes become unmanageable.

When you are desperate or anxious   to possess a particular  commodity urgently, that emotion will most probably outweigh your patience for research or caution.

Disadvantages Of Social Media-Based Shopping

All said and done, what could be the downsides of buying from social media storefronts?

Let's examine some of them as follows:

1.  Possible Risk Of Scam/Fraud

You stand the risk of falling prey to scam.

For instance, you could  discover much later that you have paid for a counterfeit or an item that never gets delivered to you.

2.  Credit Card Theft:

When you enter your payment details on a compromised or fake site, there's a serious likelihood that your account information could be stolen, fraudulently exploited, or sold.

3.  There's No Buyer Protection.

That's basically due to the fact that you are not patronizing a major trusted retailer.

It means nobody will be offering you any customer support, warranty, or means to obtain refund in the event that something goes wrong.

4.  Product Quality Disappointments

You may end up paying for one thing and getting not exactly what you bargained for.

For example, you could receive items that are nothing more than cheap, low-grade imitations which absolutely fail to match what you saw in their advertised pictures.

This is referred to as "Bait-and-Switch".

5.  Hidden Recurrent Charges

Unknown to you, when you purchase something from social media storefronts, certain automatic actions may be triggered against you without your awareness.

For instance, clicking the link might automatically enroll you in a subscription service with recurring monthly fees, which you could find virtually impossible to reverse.

Assuming you somehow find a way to cancel, you may have to absorb unexpected charges and hassles.

6.  Zero Customer Service

In the event that problems crop up in your transactions, you would most likely be left out in the cold.

As a matter of fact, there would be no person or desk to complain to.

That means you could lose your money irretrievably.

7.  Loss Of Personal Data

Patronizing social media storefronts could equally open you up to spam and data harvesting activities.

What this suggests is that you could lose your personal details especially email address, phone number, etc, to scammers' lists, which they can also sell to other telemarketers or scammers.

8.  Risk To Your Account Security

Moving forward, unguarded or careless  buying on social media platforms may ensnare you in a web of malicious sites.

These could inflict malware or phishing attacks on your system and by so doing compromise your device and other accounts.

9.  One-Way Traffic

The back-and-forth is usually strictly limited and unfavourable to the shopper's welfare.

For one, there may be no provisions for returning faulty or unsatisfactory goods.

Also. assuming there was, the process and cost might be quite cumbersome and expensive.

What this implies is that once delivered, you may get stuck with an unwanted product.

How Scammers Exploit Social Media Shopping

1. Establishing Unreal Storefronts

Scam practitioners regularly exploit innocent shoppers by creating fake online shops or stores which on the surface appear real.

They will go to great length to deceive you by applying logos and descriptions to make it look believable, but in reality it's not a genuine business.

2. Utilizing Stolen Photos

They will use photos (stolen from other websites or stores) of products in order to make them appear genuine and more appealing.

For example, a scammer may seek to deceive you by displaying images of iPhone, Techno, etc, stolen from the original companies' websites.

In the true sense it's merely an attempt to sell a fake or used phone to you.

3. Offering Cheap Prices

They know that most of us love to make savings on whatever we purchase.

Who doesn't love low prices?

So they leverage on this weakness by extending cheap products to you.

By using low prices that are obviously too-good-to-be-true, they attempt to lure you into buying quickly and without thinking.

For example, they could be offering you 50% off an iPhone normal price, but in reality it's just a scam.

4. No Delivery, No Refund

Most typically, once you have paid, you may not receive the products.

That's not all.

To get a refund of your money is like chasing a ghost too. How is that even going to materialize, when you can't even contact them?

5. Product Condition Disappointment

You are set for a rude shock, because usually it's not what you bargained for that you receive.

You may be expecting high quality items but you get low quality ones.

It could even be physically broken, or just doesn't function  as promised or at all.

Who are you going to cry to?

There's no provision for product return or refund, remember?

6. Peddling Phony Merchandise

Scammers specialize in passing off fake goods as genuine brands.

The commodities could be any grade from substandard to even dangerous types.

For instance, a fraudster may market sham designer shoes or handbags which appear to be real.

However, they may later turn out to made of cheap materials and  of course fall apart easily.

7. Payment Scams

Moreover, in such scenarios, the given payment methods are far from being honest or transparent.

Indeed, the norm is to ensnare you to make payments through unsecured or untraceable payment channels.

To demonstrate, they may ask that you pay up through money transfer services which can't be reversed or tracked, such as Western Union.

8. Lack Of Customer Support Service

Furthermore, in such unverified online or social media shopping, there's a total lack of customer service.

You obviously don't have access to contact them.

Even when there's a means of doing so, your messages will be ignored or blocked.

In any case, most assuredly the scammer's phone number and email are fake.

9. Conducting Fraudulent Phishing Activities

In addition, part of the payment requirements for your online buying may be to log into certain pages or take surveys that are definitely fake.

They will justify these as a need for "verification" or  "delivery purposes."

As a case in point, you may receive email ostensibly from a delivery company, which tells you to log in to track your package.

Don't be fooled.

It's highly possible that's really a phishing trap to steal your login credentials.

10. Fabricated Reviews

Finally, in order to confuse shoppers to believe that their storefronts and products are bonafide, scammers frequently post fake reviews.

Actually, these are  stolen materials from fake accounts or paid reviewers. 

Consider this:  when you see a post of 100 fabricated 5-star reviews for a particular product, you could believe it's a bestseller, right?

However, once you have bought it, it will become obvious you've got a defective article on your hand.

10 Ways To Avert Being Scammed On Social Media Shopping

At this juncture, it's time to hit the gavel on the lectern of solutions.

What is the way forward?

Here are some precautions I propose we take while we are  shopping online:

1. Confirm Who The Seller Is

This is top priority.

You need to verify the person or company you want to buy from.

Confirm details like:

• Are they legitimate businesses?
• Product Reviews
• Ratings
• Genuine business address
• Responsive Customer Service lines and email

As a best practice move, you can research the seller's reputation by:

• ensuring you locate their verified badge on Facebook, Instagram, other social media;
• checking out their ratings on Google Reviews.

2. Enforce Personal Data Encryption By Ensuring HTTPS Connectivity:

This is very important because HTTPS encrypts data that's  being transmitted between your browser and the seller's website.

Doing so will make it difficult for cybercriminals to intercept sensitive account details like passwords, credit card numbers, or personal data.

Additionally, HTTPS protocol  automatically  verifies the website's identity and ascertains that you're interacting  with an authentic  website and not an imposter.

How to do this?

Check the website's address or url for "https" and a lock icon in the address bar.

The presence of these elements constitute clear proof that your data is encrypted and protected.

3. Beware of Greek Gifts

My Yoruba people have a saying: "Ona ofun Ona orun" which means that long throat or greed can be quite destructive.

In like manner, obsession with love of low prices can land somebody in a scammer's trap.

For example, imagine there's a 70% off the normal price of a product?

How feasible or valid can that be?

Frankly speaking, if the pricing is too good to be true, that's a red line already.

To stay safe, it's best you  compare prices with various sellers to ensure it's all real.

4.  Be Certain Of The   Seller's Contact Information

Be meticulous and patient about your transactions.

Make double sure that the merchant's site has a clear contact method, especially  phone number, email,  physical address details, etc.

Additionally, check their "Contact Us" page as well as their social media profiles for reliable contact information.

5.  Utilize Secure Payment Methods

Avoid paying through direct bank deposits and wire transfers, because these are  irretrievable and irreversible once paid.

It's better you employ  payment methods like credit cards or PayPal, because they offer buyer protection.

Besides, if anything should go wrong, they can help you to get a refund of your money.

6.  Suspect Messages Of "Urgent"

Be very skeptical of notes of urgency in your shopping activities.

Scammers are fond of trying to stampede or pressure unsuspecting persons into hasty buying.

Whenever you encounter their usual tricks of "limited stock"   or "sale ends in one hour", resist the urge to rush.

Instead, take your time and carry out due diligence or research on both seller and products.

7.  Opt For Social Media's Built-in Shopping Features

It's safer to engage readymade inbuilt traditional shopping features of a social media.

Unlike unverified storefronts, these features provide some level of protection.

A look at some of them, such as Facebook and Instagram, reveals that you can securely purchase products directly from their apps and enjoy their effective built-in protections and reviews.

8.  Check Out Product Authenticity

To avoid being scammed you should ascertain that the product is authentic.

You can do this by following these steps:

• Patronize only authorized dealers, official brand websites, or reputable retailers.
• Verify product labels, holograms, serial numbers, or other authentication marks.
• Check for proper packaging, logos, and branding.
• Research the merchandise and its details on official websites

9.  Don't Click on Suspicious Links

While shopping online or on social media, be very careful what you click on.

If any link appears suspicious, then  leave it alone.

In fact, if you don't trust the source and can't vouch for it, you should resist downloading attachments from it.

That's because they may contain malware or phishing scams.

Malware is a malicious software which harms devices, steals data, or compromises security.

10. Report Suspicious Activity

On a final note, let's remind ourselves of how vital feedback is.

One Of the crucial initial steps to stopping crime is to bring it to official attention.

Therefore, you should always do the needful: report suspicious activities to relevant security or anti-crime government agencies.

Also,  you can do this by engaging Facebook's reporting tool, or notifying your local consumer protection agency.

Conclusion

To round up, there's nothing wrong with online shopping if the environment is secure and genuine.

However, shoppers need to exercise much caution to protect themselves from scammers.

For one, if they must buy online, they need to be sure that they are dealing with genuine businesses and  authorized personnel.

Again, it's important for them to take cognizance of the downsides of shopping on social media storefronts.

As we examined in the preceding lines, they ought to be meticulous, extra-careful, observe due diligence, and apply security measures in their approach to online shopping.

In this way they can insulate themselves from scam activities.