PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — If you see an ad on your social media feed or get an email with a hyperlink, be careful — it could be a phony website.
The Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office is warning holiday shoppers about online scams that collect personal and account information.
“It looks just like the legitimate website but it actually isn’t,” warned Sarah Frasch, director of the office’s Bureau of Consumer Protection.
“Someone was shopping for pajamas for the family for the holidays,” she shared as an example. “They wanted matching pajamas. They saw an ad on a social media site. They clicked on the ad and it looked just like the ones they saw before and they put in their payment information, and unfortunately, nothing came.”
You can tell if it is a legitimate website by looking at the URL in the search bar, she said. “Look at the hyperlink bar at the top of your website to see if the website is the name of the company that you are trying to shop on.”
Frasch said it’s best not to use a hyperlink from an ad or in an email. Rather, go directly to the merchant’s website to make a purchase.
In the last 10 years, social media has grown significantly in the way companies advertise their products, and scammers are exploiting that, she added.
Officials ask anyone who may have been duped in a similar scam to contact the Pennsylvania Office of the Attorney General.