But What if it's NOT? by knightinshiningarmou |  |
NEOPIA CENTRAL - Greetings, all. I was hanging around the Chat Boards the other
day. I most commonly frequent the Battledome and Help Boards. I have to say,
I have never seen a board remain scam free for over 10 minutes. Sooner or later,
something pops up: From "Buy something from my shop to find out the location
of the Hidden Junkyard" to "Post this 10 times for a free Faerie Paint Brush."
Why do Neopians still fall for these things? There is a Wall
of Shame clearly identifying all of these things as scams, and yet I
am sure every day somebody falls for one of these. The reason is simple: Neopia
is constantly growing. Every day hundreds of new members enter our little corner
of the Internet. And these are the victims. Scammers prey on the new and unlearned
members of this society.
Before I proceed any further, I must say that I too have been scammed - on
more than one occasion. The last instance must be well over a year ago now,
but I remember all clearly. First of all, there was: "I'm leaving Neopets, all
those who buy something from my shop will receive a Faerie Paint Brush. Proceeds
go to the money tree." I went to his shop. Bottled sands, Palm Fans and Sandals
priced at 5,000 NP. I bought 1 and of course received nothing. Another was a
girl who told me her Trading Post did not work, and told me she would swap an
item worth 20, 000 for her Faerie Paint Brush. I bought it for her. I'm sure
you can guess what I got in return.
So, why do we all still fall for it? Because, I can remember having read the
Wall of Shame before falling for those two. But I went and gave away my hard
earned Neopoints anyway. It's just the rush, the excitement, and the chance
at getting something so easily. You know it's probably a scam, but you still
worry. What if it's NOT a scam, what if someone really is giving this away?
Then you'd be a fool not to do it.
But ask yourself the question: WHY? Why do they want to do this? In the above
scam, would it not have been easier for the guy to just put the Paint Brushes
in the shop rather than the worthless items? He could still give the profits
to the money tree. And that girl could just have sold her Faerie Paint Brush
for 99,999 NP and made much more of a profit than she was making with me. So
please, Neopians, for your own sake, THINK the next time something too good
to be true pops up - because as the Wall of Shame says, "If it looks too
good to be true, it probably is."
And now, here is an in-depth look at a couple of Neopian scams. Please remember
this article next time you see one.
The Neopoints Generator: "Hello, my friend and I made this special program
that hacks into the Neopets system. Just put your username and password in the
box below and you'll get 50,000 NP." This is usually what these things go along
the lines of. But rest assured you will never get anything from them. Fill in
the forms on these sites, and your username and password will get sent to the
scammer, leaving your account open for the taking.
Change your E-mail: Not everyone fully understands how this works. You
know the "Recover your lost password" system? Well, this scam basically wants
you to change your account e-mail, therefore changing the e-mail your password
gets sent to. They tell you to change it to their e-mail (They will make an
e-mail account for this, with a name like neopointmaker@blahblahblah.com) Then
they enter your account name into the password recovery system, and they're
into your account.
My Trading Post doesn't work: These people will tell you there is a
problem with their computer. You'll notice how it ALWAYS seems to be the people
with those perfect offers on the items you want to trade that just can't get
their trading post to work. You will run into this a lot when you are looking
for one particular rare item. (I found it a lot when I was trying for a Krawk)
They will give varying reasons for it not working--ignore all of them. The Trading
Post has been taken down and reworked many times, and now works on every version
of every system.
The Referral Maker: Not a very popular scam, but one I have seen here
and there. These people will link you to sites. Provide you've listened to the
above advice, you're thinking, "Here's another NP Generator". But then, strangely,
they don't ask you to do anything that would give your account away. No password,
no e-mail changes...so what's the deal? The program links you to the Neopets
home page, tells you to make an account there and it will be given a huge amount
of NP soon after creation. If you look at the page you're being linked to, you'll
see you are referring the person. Sure, you won't lose anything doing this,
but it's a waste of time and abuses the Neopets Referral System.
Trading Post Scams: These scams are pretty blatant and obvious. Basically,
in a persons wish list they say: "Whoever puts best offer gets 20,000 as well."
There are just too many new trades constantly popping up for Neopets to keep
watch over the Trading Post, so just stay away from these scams. When none are
successful, they WILL eventually die out. Trust me.
The Log-Out Shops: Last but not least, these shops will have items such
as a Baby Paint Brush for sale at 5,000 NP. Once again, too good to be true.
Click on them, and you will be linked to a Neopets login page. Basically, the
person has taken the HTML from the real login page, and put onto a Web page
on a host like Angelfire or Geocities. And when you log in on these fake pages,
the person will have the Log In button changed so the name and password get
sent to them. People can be very creative with HTML and can make these pages
look very real. Be careful, and if you are really worried you got logged out,
hit back a few times and go click the actual login button on the sidebar and
log in from there.
Well that's my two cents everyone, I hope I have saved one or two innocent
Neopians Neopoints, and made some scammers lives a bit more difficult. And remember,
no report EVERY scam you see! There may be many, but by not reporting them just
because of this you're helping scammers! Alert abuse@neopets.com
to every single scam you see, and remember that there are scams not listed here
so stay on guard and remember the saying - IF IT LOOKS TO GOOD TO BE TRUE,
IT PROBABLY IS. |
