SAN ANTONIO – The holidays are right around the corner and many online shoppers are eagerly anticipating the delivery of their online purchases. But consumers also need to be wary of scammers posing as a delivery service provider like FedEx or UPS.
Here are a tips on how you can keep your sensitive financial information from getting into the wrong hands:
"Phishing through a missed delivery scam is something we've seen in the past, but it’s growing in popularity,” said Regional Director of the Better Business Bureau Miguel Segura.
The attempts to fool people is growing during the holiday season as online shopping becomes more and more popular with days like Cyber Monday, the BBB said.
"Your parcels are ready to pick up, please open this attachment so we could send you your package. It’s ready for pickup or we tried to deliver your package, but no one was home please respond to this email," said one man targeted by scammers.
"By clicking on this link, you download malware on your computer which accesses or gives access to a scammer all of your sensitive information. Or what it can do is redirect you to another website-a fake website, and it’s going to ask you to enter your credit card information and pay an additional sort of delivery fee. Both of these cases result in identity theft," Segura said.
One of the easiest ways to tell a fake is to check the sender's email address, Segura showed KSAT12 one that was sent from Kazakhstan. The BBB has received at least 10 reports of this missed delivery scam in the last year, but believes many incidents go unreported.
A San Antonio man, who asked not to be identified, called the BBB after he said he received several unsolicited emails -- sometimes several times a week.
"I asked my wife, 'Are you expecting a package from FedEx?' She said, 'No.' I said, 'Have you ever given FedEx our email?' She said 'No'. At that point, I thought, ‘How did they get our email?’ It was a red flag for me."
The BBB is asking people to be careful when reviewing these types of emails, they may look very real, but are in fact, fake. One way to check is to hover over the hyperlink, you will see a box pop up with the web address where it will take you. But rather than clicking on the provided link, it’s much safer to type in the web address to the site you want to visit on your own and then enter your tracking number.
To report a scam to the BBB, head over to: https://www.bbb.org/scamtracker/us/