Agape Blog

Have you heard of this? A number of scams are coming to light now-a-days through the web. One of them is known as the Craigslist scam. Craigslist is a centralized network of online communities with free online classified advertisements like jobs, housing, personals, for sale, services, community, gigs, résumés, and great resource for selling things, finding apartments, locating services and meeting people etc. It is an upcoming and a great service but it never comes with some risk. If you deal with people you aren’t meeting face to face you risk getting scammed.

The buyer and seller on Craigslist are not alert to the danger or deception. Most of these scams follow the same pattern that we see on eBay and other online auction sites. Try posting some easily-mailed valuable item for sale and the first response you get will probably be someone trying to trick you into believing it’s true.

Advice on avoiding scams to people using Craigslist service-

• Deal locally with folks you can meet in
• Never wire funds online, money gram or any other wire service - anyone who asks you to do so is a scammer.
• Fake cashier checks & money orders are common, and banks will cash them and then hold you responsible when the fake is discovered weeks later.
• Never give out financial information (bank account number, social security number, eBay/PayPal info, etc.)
• Avoid deals involving shipping or escrow services and know that ONLY A SCAMMER WILL “GUARANTEE” YOUR TRANSACTION.

Michelle Mitra
Executive: Fraud Management System
Agape Inc