This holiday season checking off that gift list will look a little different than in past years.
ALSO READ: Kempton police make breakthrough in social media scam case
Many shoppers are planning to rely on e-commerce for a significant amount of their holiday shopping.
Digital gift card sales are also likely to increase.
However, given the spike in digital activity predicted over the holidays, cybercriminals, too, will make their lists and checking them twice.
It’s a risky time of the year as shoppers of all ages (including some with less experience recognising digital threats) flock to search engines and online channels to place orders before holiday delivery date cutoffs.
And opportunistic hackers know just how to create enticing, seasonally appropriate lures and even some of the simplest scams can fool adept online shoppers.
Online holiday gift scams
If you ever received a strange email urging you to help a friend or family member with an emergency and that email led you down the path of providing a gift card as payment, that email was almost certainly a scam.
Gift cards are a common vector for cybercriminals and scammers, since stealing the money loaded onto them is like stealing cash: once it’s taken, there’s virtually no way for a victim to get it back, unlike credit card transactions, which allow chargebacks.
ALSO READ: CoE warns of license scam
Around the holiday season, when gift card purchases spike, thieves are on the lookout for easy ways to take…
