Nowadays, if you’re looking for a house, a date or even a service, the best place to look for it is on Craigslist, an online classified site that is categorized by virtually any city.
However, the technology that has made it easier to find what you need has also made it easier for scam artists to take advantage of those who least expect it. Craigslist is a perfect example of that. On any day of the week, you can find hundreds of local listings that include all apartment and home rentals, cars for sale, concert and play tickets, job ads and just about every conceivable secondhand item you can think of. But scammers are very creative and have put together elaborate rouses to trick even the best buyer.
The good news is that you don’t have to avoid Craigslist and all of its wonderful opportunities to avoid being taken advantage of. This Top 10 Article examines things you need to be wary of when on Craigslist.
1. Property Fraud
In this sinister and menacing internet scam, the “landlord” will list a home or apartment at an incredibly good price. They’ll feature photos of an gorgeous place with the preferred amenities. Of course, they’ll have dozens of people respond to the ad and most will want to grab it before it’s gone. This landlord is all too willing to please everyone too. In fact, he will collect deposits, including the first and last month’s rent, and other fees from anyone who’s interested – and then just skip town.
The problem comes when all the renters try to move in and discover it was never the landlord’s to rent in the first place. In one case, such a “landlord” walked away with $60,000 in collected fees from potential renters from a single apartment.
2. Censorship Issues
Parents need to be careful before sending their children on Craigslist. There are listings on the website which use nudity and course language. This website should viewed by children only when accompanied by an adult. One does not need to browse too long to view nudity, especially in the dating/relationships column.
It seems that Internet censorship has been getting a lot of press lately, the Google/China issue attracting most of the media attention. In he spotlight is Craigslist, one of the largest classified ads sites on the Internet. The latest debate is over whether Craigslist should be more proactive in censoring those who post on it. The all began when some apartment listings appeared to be racially slanted. This and other events lead us to once again visit the questions, “Should the Internet be censored?”, especially with adult listings so easily accessible by all.
3. Robbery Issues
On the news it was revealed that a man lost his possessions because of Craigslist. Many people would come in and refuse to stop taking the possessions and cited an ad on the website as the source and reason for theft. Craigslist has done little to not allow posters to make ‘fake’ postings.
4. Affiliate Marketing Scams
Craigslist warns people about scams and affiliated marketing. They have done their job to protect its readers and viewers partly. Recently it has come to my attention that a company was offering a job to those who want to be ‘mystery shoppers’. They would send them a cheque through Fedex for thousands of dollars. A specific amount of money would go to buying merchandise at supermarkets, another portion went to writing a report and another portion was to be sent to a bank in Philippines through money wire. After extensive email reading and correspondences, the story did check out to be as a scam. The advertisement was up on the website for 1 month until it got shut down.
5. Fake Funds
Con artists are very good at writing fraudulent checks, money orders, and cashier’s checks. Some car owners have found out the hard way after they release their car to such a buyer, the check bounces or comes back as a fraud.
I ran into this situation when I applied for a job on Craigslist doing mystery shopping. The guy sent me a cheque for $3000 and asked me to go shop at Walmart and deposit the rest of the money to a Philippines bank account. The cheque was fraudulent.