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Simple ways to sidestep scams this holiday season
During holiday periods, scammers tailor their tactics to catch your attention - and catch you out. Here’s how you can double down on your defences.
5 minutes
At this time of year, scammers mimic the marketing, communication and online shopfronts of popular brands, including online retailers and delivery services. They do this to attract your attention and to appear legitimate.
In days gone by, scammers relied on their own social skills to convince their targets. Now, with the internet at their fingertips, their techniques range from texting you directly to being completely contactless.
That means whether you’re tracking a parcel or shopping online during the holiday season, you should take a moment before you take action and scan for signs that a scammer is trying to catch you off guard. It’s these small steps that will help keep your money in the right hands.
Shopping online?
Think before you click
Whether it’s via search engine or social media, most of us begin our shopping search online1. At peak periods for retail, scammers use this to their advantage, setting up their own online shopfronts and profiles.
Their strategies have been successful. For example, online shopping scams had the third-highest number of reports to Scamwatch last year, with losses totalling $14.9 million2.
Scammers will pretend to be a legitimate retailer, impersonating well-known and trusted brands. They also pretend to have genuine accounts on social media as buyers and sellers. Sophisticated operators do a good job at looking credible, including sponsoring advertisements and writing their own reviews. That’s why it’s important to look beyond the surface.
Tell-tale signs of online shopping scams
Beware the bargains
An item is available at an unusually low price.
Flawless feedback
Reviews are only positive and are light on details.
Peculiar payments
The payment method is unusual, such as asking for gift cards or cryptocurrency. Payment details of the buyer or seller might also not line up to their shopfront or profile.
The fear factor
There are urgent warnings to pay quickly or click a link.
No-show negotiators
A buyer or seller doesn’t want to meet you in person. Or sometimes, scammers will give a fake address to buyers, in an attempt to convince you they’re legitimate.
Refund red flag
A buyer may say they’ve overpaid you and ask for a refund – but you never receive the payment in the first place.
Did you know?
Gen Z and Millennials are more likely to be victim to an online scam compared to other generations, despite being tech savvy and digital natives. This could be due to a range of factors, including being more comfortable and risk tolerant in an online environment.3 Being time poor is also a risk factor, as it might mean skipping the fine print.
Waiting for a parcel? Sense check your tracking
All year, scammers impersonate well-known delivery services and couriers, in an attempt to access your details and push you to make payments to their fake operation. They may ask for your personal, banking and card details.
Around the holiday season, scammers take advantage of the spike in the number of Australians waiting on their online deliveries, and target people using fake emails and texts updating them on the status of their parcel.
Classic signs of delivery scams
The text or email
You receive a text message or email claiming that your parcel couldn’t be delivered, or similar, and that your details need to be updated as a result.
The link
The text or email has a link that takes you to a website where you enter your personal information or your payment details.
The urgency
The text or email has a sense of urgency to it, for example it may suggest that your delivery will fail if you don’t update your details.
Stay away from scam recovery services
If you are the victim of a scam, it can be an understandably stressful and difficult time. There are steps you can take to limit the impact on your life and finances.
One important step is speaking to your bank or financial institution – remembering to always use trusted and independently verified contact details. For example, don’t use a phone number that is sent to you in an unsolicited text or email.
Unfortunately, one in three victims of a scam have been scammed more than once4. This is often because their details have been passed on to other scammers. So, in the wake of a scamming incident, be especially careful of offers to help you recover your funds.
Signs of money recovery scams
Impersonating institutions
A person contacting you says they’re from an official government agency, sent to help you recover your lost funds.
Promising advertisements
An advertisement, often on social media, promises a fund recovery service for victims of scams.
Requesting access
A person asks for your details or remote access to your devices, saying it’s part of the recovery process.
Your security steps
As scammers evolve their tactics, you should too, and staying informed is an important way to keep you one step ahead.
Even though scammers’ tactics are broadening in scope and sophistication, these three principles apply across the board to help keep your money and your personal information safe:
Pause
Is this call, text, or email out of the blue? Take a moment to think it through and if in doubt, don’t go any further.
Process
Is someone asking you to urgently click a link, transfer money, or provide your details? Your bank will not ask you to do that and neither should a legitimate service provider.
Proceed
If you are comfortable following steps one and two, always independently navigate to your bank or service provider’s trusted website or app to verify and proceed.
For more information and resources, you can visit our Scams Hub.
Additional Information
Footnotes
1 Deloitte Retail Holiday Report, 2024
2 Targeting scams: report of the ACCC on scams activity, 2023
3 Gen Z and Millennials are more likely to fall for online scams despite being more digitally connected, RMIT, October 2023
4 Help to spot and avoid scams, Scamwatch, 2024
Disclaimer
This information is provided by Macquarie Bank Limited. Scamwatch resources were used to inform this piece.