Spotting Online Classified Ad Scams

The thing about using classified ad sites is that they can be somewhat dangerous…but only if you’re going in blind. If you’re being careful, they simply aren’t going to be an issue.

That being said, scams do exist.

Online classified ad scams aren’t a new thing. They’ve been around since the dawn of the internet, because people are simply intent on trying to steal from others. It’s a troublesome thing for sure, but it’s not the end of the world to try and avoid these sorts of things.

We’ve seen it all when it comes to scams. We’ve seen phishers and cam girls, as well as escorts crawling all over sites that simply aren’t well-moderated. Personal dating scams are becoming more and more common unfortunately, but if you know what to look for, it’s also incredibly easy to avoid them.

We definitely know what to look for.

There are so many different scams out there that it might seem overwhelming and frightening at first, but if you know how to avoid them, you’re simply not going to have an issue.

There are a lot of sites out there that simply don’t care about the kinds of people that populate their site, or if those people aren’t really people at all. These are the kinds of sites you want to avoid, and being able to tell them apart with a single glance is a skill you should hone.

Fake profiles are the first clue.

Most of the time, you can hop onto a dating site and see if it’s full of sex classified ad scams with one glance. That’s because these sites are populated with fake profiles–that is, profiles that are made by moderators, or just scammers in general in order to pad the site and make it seem more populated.

Now, it isn’t always the site’s fault that this happens. There can be scammers that simply sign up as many times as they can on free sites in order to make you click on their profile at least once. That being said, sometimes, it simply is the site’s fault. They might be the ones making these fake profiles…and that’s just downright sleazy behavior that we don’t condone.

Pay close attention to profile pics.

Profile pictures are some of the best ways to tell if a profile is fake or not. On the worst sites, you’ll actually go to the main page and see several of the same picture cluttered around with different usernames. This is a sure sign that these are all fakes, and it’s best to avoid this site in general.

The other kind of profile pics that you’ll see are pictures that are simply clipped from pornos. It’s sort of pathetic to think of sites ripping from porn to try and pad their site with fakes, but they do it all the time to make it seem as if they have a ton of extra members hanging around.

Even if someone isn’t trying to scam you and they’re using a fake pic, there’s probably a reason you’re not going to be happy with the fact that they’re using it in the first place!

Never, ever give out your personal information.

This should be obvious, but scammers can be very, very convincing when it comes to trying to snatch up your personal info and use it for their own devises.

The problem is that many scammers are exceptionally good at posing as site administrators. They might send you e-mails or messages on the site, telling you that your account has been hacked, or that they need to access it in order to fix an issue. Never, ever click on a link in an e-mail unless it’s verified, because it might take you to a fake login page that makes it easy for these scammers to steal your information.

You should also never give an ‘administrator’ your login information. There’s a pretty good chance that this person isn’t an administrator at all, but instead someone trying to milk every bit of info out of you that they can.

If you’re vigilant, you’ll be fine.

While there are tons of other kinds of scammers out there, it’s not difficult to avoid them so long as you keep your personal information close, and don’t give it out over e-mails to anyone that you’ve met on the site.

You’ll even see women on these sites that try and wheedle money out of you. If that starts to happen, it’s easy to just stop having contact with them. Never, ever pay for something for a woman that you haven’t started dating yet. They’re just gold diggers at that point, and that’s not the point of getting on these dating sites at all.

It’s important to stay safe.

If you’re safe, you’re having fun. That’s the long and short of avoiding scams.