Beware of the Amazon fake email scam that is conning shoppers out of hundreds of pounds
One customer has £160 worth of gift cards stolen and £112 worth of orders made on his account
AMAZON shoppers are being warned about a scam where fraudsters trick customers out of their personal details - and then use their account to place orders or spend gift cards.
One customer has had £160 worth of gift cards stolen and £112 worth of goods fraudulently ordered from his account, according to financial magazine Moneywise.
He also discovered that an Amazon Prime subscription - costing £79 a year - had been taken out in his name.
Scammers were able to access his account and spend money he had loaded on to gift cards and make additional orders using his account details.
The customer was able to get a refund, plus an additional £160 was paid to him by Amazon.
Amazon told The Sun Online it cannot comment on individual cases but there have been instances where customers have had their details stolen via fake email scams.
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The email, which looks like it’s genuinely from Amazon, tricks customers into thinking there is a problem processing their order or asks them to log in to change details on their account.
It then asks you to click on a link and confirm your account details. The phishing scam then collects up your personal information – giving fraudsters access to your personal and financial information.
An Amazon spokesperson said: “These can look similar to real Amazon emails but often direct the recipient to a false website where they might be asked to provide account information such as their email address and password combination.”
How to protect yourself from scams
FIRSTLY, remember that if something seems too good to be true, it normally is.
Check brands are "verifed" on Facebook and Twitter pages - this means the company will have a blue tick on their profile.
Look for grammatical and spelling errors; fraudsters are notoriously bad at writing proper English. If you receive a message from a “friend” informing you of a freebie, consider whether it’s written in your friend’s normal style.
If you’re invited to click on an URL, hover over the link to see the address it will take you to – does it look genuine?
To be on the really safe side, don’t click on unsolicited links in messages, even if they appear to come from a trusted contact.
Be careful when opening email attachments too. Fraudsters are increasingly attaching files, usually PDFs or spreadsheets, which contain dangerous malware.
If you receive a suspicious message then report it to the company, block the sender and delete it.
Scammers then use your details to access your account. The best way to ensure that you do not respond to a false or phishing email is to always go directly to your account on Amazon to review or make any changes to your orders or your account.
A spokesperson added: “We would ask any customer who believes that they have received a false or phishing email to alert us via our stop-spoofing@amazon.com email address.”
The Sun Online first reported on the fake Amazon email scam back in November last year.
In January, another victim lost £750 in a similar Amazon email scam.
Action Fraud said it had received a string of complaints from people who’ve also been conned by fake Amazon emails.
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