As people are finishing up their last-minute shopping for gifts, officials are warning people to be vigilant and on the lookout for holiday scams.
One of the increasing challenges for consumers is ordering a package online, and then a scammer comes and steals the package off the front porch. It’s estimated that 58 million Americans have become victims of porch piracy this year. Those stolen gifts are worth more than $12 billion dollars in total.
“With how much we're ordering online nowadays, it's very easy to expect a package,” said Danny Katz with the Colorado Public Interest Group. “When you get an email or you get a text message that says, ‘Hey, your package couldn't be delivered, and you need to immediately click on this link and provide us with some information,’ It sounds real, it sounds authentic.”
But thieves don’t have to wait for the physical package to rip you off. The more people order online, the more opportunity there is to get scammed.
“It's very easy to then get tricked into thinking we need to provide some information, or somehow the shipping rate was more than anticipated, so you need to pay this additional $5,” Katz said. “Those things can really resonate.”
Another common scam around the holidays is fake ticket websites selling seats for concerts, shows and movies that don’t actually exist.
“Nobody thinks they're going to fall victim to one of these things until you fall victim to one of these scams,” Katz said. “They're designed to take advantage of information that you wouldn't think they'd have ... so it is reasonable to expect that some of us are going to fall victim to (these scams).”
CoPIRG has posted some common scams and some guidance on how to avoid them. Katz’s main tip is that consumers should always go to the original ordering site to check package information instead of clicking on links in a text or email. It’s also best to talk with shipping companies directly if someone needs to confirm any questionable charges.
But the holidays aren’t the only time people can get scammed. The Colorado Attorney General’s office received more than 800 complaints last year about imposter scams, which was in the top five categories of complaints. The state has reason to believe there’s even more scams that go unreported.
The AG’s office has received several reports of scammers using artificial intelligence to sound like a grandchild asking for money in jail. Some have also impersonated health care providers looking for credit card information, or law enforcement saying someone will be arrested for not showing up to jury duty.
Other scams involve sending a Venmo transaction or using cryptocurrency, which can be harder to rectify.
“They may act without thinking,” Attorney General Phil Weiser said. “In each version of it, they're trying to scare someone into giving up their hard earned money in a way they're never getting it back.”
Weiser said convincing scams have proliferated because of advances in technology.
“There are more ways that you can be scammed than ever before,” he said. “The tools that the scammers have – artificial intelligence, spoofing a phone number so it looks like it came from a different number – are all going to make it riskier for you to give into a scam without realizing what happened.”
Scam victims need to be careful and do their homework before clicking on any links or responding to any unusual phone calls. They should also report their story to stopfraudcolorado.gov so officials can learn more about what’s out there and possibly take action.
