How to Check if a Website is a Scam
The internet is full of opportunities to make money and earn passive income. With these great opportunities, there also comes risk of scams.
Way back before I started this site, I have already been searching for ways to make money on the internet. I even tried enrolling in make easy money programs online, only to find out it was a scam. But I have no regrets because through my years of experience, I have grown and is now more cautious in investing online.
Here are ways to check if a website is indeed legitimate.
Check the Contact Information VS Whois Information
Any decent website would definitely have a contact page with company address and contact numbers. Check the informations using a whois search if they match. Most of the time, fraudulent websites state that their company resides in the US but has a different story when checked in the domain whois.
Check the Age of the Website
A several month old website is more likely to be a scam site, although not all of them are. Because of this uncertainty, I only use the age of domain as an additional information in deciding whether the site is legitimate or not.
Check How Long is the Domain Name Registered
Do a quick domain lookup. Websites that plan to stay long in the business registers their domain names several years in advance. If the domain name is registered for only a year, I’d already have my doubts.
Check the Neighbors of the Website
Do a quick IP search to check the hosting neighbors of the website. Most fraudulent websites are in a shared IP address. If the neighbors sounds fishy or looks spammy, I won’t risk dealing with the site.
Ask Websites Associated with the One You Are Checking
Most people would ask around forums on whether a site could be trusted or not. The problem with this is you are asking for other people’s opinion. Opinions help but doesn’t really answer.
What you want is to contact websites associated with the company like it’s web hosts or site partners. This way, you are asking a person with the knowledge to answer you back with confidence.
Look at Reviews or Customer Feedbacks
This can only be done if the website does have reviews or show customer feedbacks. If not, you can contact the customers personally. Ask the customers about their experience with the company. Did they get paid? How long have they been a member?
It was actually a good thing for me getting scammed for several bucks. At least now, I am more careful when I am dealing with new opportunities.
Lastly, I would like to emphasize that it is good to doubt fishy offers, but let us also be open minded because there really are many genuine opportunities on ways to make money online.
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Have you been scammed? I’d like to hear some of your experiences.
Technorati Tags: domain lookup, fraud, scam, whois
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you’ve been tag, by fellow wpp. http://myglitch.wordpress.com/2007/11/09/7-glitch/
waaa.. scams.. thanx for the info. nice blog..
Thanks a bunch Jayson.
Hope you found this tip useful. But most importantly, use it and don’t get yourself scammed. Haha.
Ye I scammed by the following site
http://www.gam-uk.co.cc and mail address are
admin@globalpostalexpress.com
ukcompany.abbey@gmail.com
info@gam-uk.co.cc
admin@globalpostalexpress.com
plz help me I sent all my details to them like pasport and address details so suggest me what shall i do now shall i complaint to the police about the scamm plz …
the web is littered with scam sites victimizing millions. thankks for lowering that risk for us. as always a great help and very informative.
Well said monaco. There are already a lot of scam sites and still growing. Glad you appreciate the tips.
yep, very useful tip! I’m sure not all (including myself) knows the techniques you posted here..
thanks!
Hehe. Thanks a bunch Eli. I know most of the techniques I used are not that popular, but it does work in finding out the truth behind those fishy sites.
Hi, the “seven” entries posted by other wpp are simplier, I also found it complicated, making it suitable to my blog’s concept.
You could check on other wpp blogs to see how they did it, I did. Thanks for dropping by.
Hi Ms. Glitch. Thanks for making this even easier for me. I’m actually checking out how the others have done it for some tips. Hehe.
Hope to see you around more often.
Nice tips. I now see that my SEO for Firefox plugin is more useful than it seems
Hi Maki. What do you mean that your SEO for Firefox plugin is more useful now?
I use SEO for Firefox only to check my site stats (PR, Alexa, Technorati, Age etc.), I didn’t realize that it would be very useful to check and verify some site stats of other websites.
[...] How to check if a website is a scam? – Mcbilly’s guide on detecting scam websites. Very helpful checklist that you can use to double check a website. [...]
sir,
is plimus inc is scam or not.
i have paid 49$ in data entry , i havent received anything.i m in homeworkrer.org
Hi deepak. I can’t access the website you provided. Could it be a typo?
Please be more specific so that I can help you with this.
I have also the same question with deepak. I am about to apply and send my payment to Plimus Inc through bank draft. The website is http://www.home-Profits.biz. I just want to know if this is a scam. So what happened now to you deepak did you receive their promises of paying you 5 USD per form after fillig out and submitting them? Please advise me regarding this before I step on this. I am also wondering why my payment is made payable to Plimus Inc. Is Plimus Inc also a scam? Is it operating legally? Mcbilly, please advise me….
Thanks
Is there a website I can use to check if a particular web-based business is a scam?
Thanks for bringing together all these usefull techniques to avoid beeing scamed. I didn’t know anything about many of them and I am very glad to discover them.
Hey I was wondering if http://www.easygpabooster.com was a scam website, there were actually advertisements on the bulletin boards at my university so I’m assuming it’s legit?
It’s legit – a good resource as well. If you’re thinking about it, I give it a nodd. Hope that helps.
I purchased a copy of easyGPAbooster and it’s good. I’m using a few the ideas, which helped me out this semester.
Hey Everybody:
Glad to hear it’s worked out well for you. I’ve heard from many happy students who’ve put it to use.
Feel free to send me your testimonials so I can publish them on the site!
Thanks for the support!
JW
что касается темы, то мне кажется актуальность будет известна только через некоторое время
Never buy any software from softwareclearancecenter.com
They don’t answer any emails and will not respond to a customer request for an exchange of paid for merchandise. A Windows version of software was purchased and actually needed MAC version. This was expensive ($697.00). Costly or not a consumer should expect to be able to communicate with a web biz operator.
Thanks sooo much Mcbilly! I followed the steps that you listed on finding out if an email I got wanting to help me find a job was legit. Turns out its not. I wrote the person who emailed me back and I never recieved a reply back after that. The domain name was: http://www.getemployed.org/ I was not able to find any reviews on it in any other blogs but it was only a month old and it has over 700 domian names registered at that IP address! Good thing I found this blog because if I hadn’t then I probably would have gone through with it.
I ordered some stuff from this website and it didnt come yet, could it be a scam. Can you please check it out and email what you think. http://www.iran-buy.com
im checkin the webite http://www.mynewcheap.co.uk and the only fishy thing is that they got shared IP address there is 6 other websites with kinda similar name… dont know if thats the hint that the website is fraudalent
i’m checking to see if the wholesaler http://www.sell777.com is a scam or not? regards,
Deej
wow this is really helpful… andami na kasi online scam ngayon which includes money making sites;; Good JOb!
http://www.downloademaillist.com; http://www.erecordfind.com; http://www.sexoffenderfiles.com; http://credit-card-processing-accept-credit-cards.com; http://www.mycourtfiles.com; http://www.cisworlwide.com;www.irstaxlines.com
claim to be in the us but they’re not! steal your information and ask you to send fax with all your information in order to remove your name from the database.
i have earned 140$ thru enzo-mails.com but i doubt it to be scam.its been copyrighted for 2008 alone ‘n i got no contact information about the location or address of that site.it jus asks me to post a question.can u plz tell me whether it is a scam site or not?
anyone heard of incomeplannow.com? what can you say abbout it? is it for real or fraud?
I want to know if I can register a site to some portal which I think can be a fraud site for verification?
http://www.freswhites.com
Can Anyone tell me if this website is a scam because they tell you their items are fake but im afraid they will take my money and never give me the item because they told me that their headquater are at China but I found out it was at Johor Bahru, Malaysia so if you can answer this it would be great
Hi there,
im just wondering if anyone out there believes this website to be fraudulent – http://www.trade369.com
Regards
Cahal
I am trying to find a good custom writing website are all of these scams? If anyone knows of a good one please let me know thanks.
Heyyyy.
I was just wondering if anyone knows if http://elitegametester.com/ is a fake site. ehhh i dont get all the technical IP Address neighbor checking stuff.
This site is really a great help! Thank you so much McBilly! It’s been a long time since I’m searching how to check websites that are legitimate or not; until I found your site, it’s really a great help to me.
By the way, do you believe on what this website had offer? http://www.my-data-team.com
Please let me know… Hope to hear from you soon!
Hi, I am trying to sell some used textbooks and I want to find out more about etextshop, if anyone has sent textbooks to them please let me know if they are honest in sending payment!
thanks!
Several years ago all scam sites looked identical. Long page with images and white background. You need some “999999 visitor – 1mln bucks for you” banners and a “quick money” sign. If it glitters it’s even better. Nowadays it’s not so easy to diminish scam site from a quality one.
I found this website but I am not sure if it is legitimate. Could you please help?
qwholesale.com
pe-export.com
and
export-panama.com
are just scammers
I got an at home job offer from this company, is it a scam? Please email me at email address listed and put the name merchant e solution in the subject. Thanks.
http://www.merchante-solutions.com/
The URL appears to be legit, however, to be certain that the email is not malicious, I suggest that you study the email headers to make sure where the email came from. Additionally, verify by hovering your cursor over the URL address that it is pointing to the IP address that belongs to this domain.
Oops! the URL could should point to the same domain name or the appropiate IP address.
Я так понимаю, в самом последнем абзаце как раз вся соль и изложена
Great tips… I like to have a PageRank checker. I love Google, so if they think the site is relevant to give them say… a page rank of 3, it’s good enough for me.
Great article, you really gave a lot of good information on this article for scam sites and I hope a lot of people read this one. I did a RT for you too!
Cheers,
Ricky
Great article, Hey guys i was going to order some supra shoes from flatspot.com which is legitimate site but saw another site which seems to offer the shoes that are out of stock at a lower price. i think its the if its too good to be true deal, and i think this website is a scam so to others unless there is specific argument forwarding support for the site i would say this one should be avoided. i mean even the logos are poorly shopped and no phone or address ¬_¬
> site) http://www.cbssports.co.uk
is gamesinwelt.com a scam?
is http://www.ecashdeals.com is scam? or real any one earning by that website for ad psoting? are they really paying or scam?
I hav been working with ecashdeals since 3 yrs . they payements are promth and the earning totally depands on the hrs of work you out into posting ads.
hi i was wondering if anyone ever ordered off of thedenimzone.com. is this website legit?
THIS LAW FIRM IS OFFERINGB TO ASSIT PEOPLE WITH HARDSHIPSLOWER THERE EXISTING INTEREST RATE AND MONTHLY PAYMENTS. ARET THEH AN EXISTNG REPUTABLE LAW FIRM?
Hey guys i wanted to find out if this site is a scam http://raybansales.com/
I just want to know if it is legitimate to by from this company
www//mediaoutlet.com, American. I have ordered dvds through them and so far non delivery. Also, not responsing to e-mails. Anybody heard anything about them? Appreciate feed-back.
could anybody tell me if http://www.xtreme-red.com/ is a scam website? its an adult entertainment website that im looking to get work through, but they want me to give them cash up front first – which sounds a bit fishy.
Основная задача Яндекса — давать ответы на вопросы пользователей!
Another place you can report is scamreporter.com
Hey.. Can I know if this websites is a scam too? AIP ONLINE SURVEY MALAYSIA. I’ve register my personal details too and im extremely worried about it.
hi..
have you heard of the site,www.closeoutisland.com?
can anyone tell me what you think of this site? is it a scam?
thanks.
Hi guys please tell me whether this site is Scam or what?
I got mail which we have sent our CV for job.
Hi guys please tell me whether this site is Scam or what?
I got mail which we have sent our CV
job.http://www.internationalcarshipping.net/home.html and email address is given like this interncarshipping@sys-w.com
plz tell me abt this site is it real or fraud?
http://www.richptc.com/
i ordered something from this website and wondering if it is a scam
can you please check it and let me know?
thanks
http://www.internationalcarshipping.net/home.html
pls let me know weather it is scam
pls let me know if this website is a scam.thank you so much
pls. let me kno if this websiteis a scam.
pls.check this website if it is a scam.http://moneymakingextreme.com
Hi all Readers,
also http://www.ezlaptop.com is a scam website which is running a scam of giving free laptop for just reading useless emails.
Partners to this crime are Yahoo (Advertiser), Apple, Sony, and other small advertisers.
As this company has a blessing of big companies and believe these are helped by alexa and other companys to promote this scam
Thanks,
Sandeep
Hi guys, I recently bought from this website, dvd-collections.net, and am now having major doubts about the legitimacy of the website. I payed over paypal, but something about the website seems fishy, can you give me some feedback on your thoughts!? THANKS!
I too would like to know. Have emailed twice but no reply. The chat person is ether away or offline. Paid by Paypal, you would assume that this would make it more legit, but maybe not.
hello
is there anyone knows about this site please if it is a scam.http://jannatenterprises.com
thanks
I received an email regarding a work-at-home offer processing emails. Does anyone know anything about this company ?
With Kindest Regards,
Sorry, new to this.
Does anyone know about http://moneymakingxtreme.com
They emailed me an offer to make money from home by processing emails.
Ecashdeals sucks… i was never paid though i worked hard.. a fraudulent company
can anyone tell me if http://www.yoyob2b.com is scam iam planning to business with them but iam scare that they are a scam please help
http://www.made4fighters.com is not what it seems. You pay them for an item and they never get back to you!
Guys, can you help me? Is Richptc.com a scam?
what do you know about http://www.oursfashion.com? is a scam?have anyone bought something from this site? thank u!
Do not buy from http://www.discountwarehouseusa.webs.com. They are scammers! I tried to communicate with them and they were extremely rude to me. They do not except paypal. They say you can order an iphone for $250. Complete scam! Just warning people. The email address they contacted me was country_boi_zach@yahoo.com. If you receive a email from this person, do not purchase from them! The mans Name in the email was Zach Smith! WARNING
———WARNING———–
TO GENERAL PUBLIC,
Please do not reply to any email or sms from bclc49.com if they say that your mobile no. or email address has won any lottery. PLEASE BE WARNED THAT BCLC49.COM IS A SCAM/FRAUD WEBSITE WITH REGISTRATION & CREATION DATE OF 24th OCT. ‘09 & EXPIRY DATE OF 24th OCT. ‘10.
is this a scam/fraud site?please message me alot of my colleagues are on this without checking its ligitimacy. Thanks.
http://www.bigmoneyptc.com a scam or fraud site please help most of my colleagues are on to this. Hope to hear from you. Thanks you!
Dear All,
I like to subcribe membership from below mention site.
http://www.netsurveyjobs.com/
Please confirm whether the same is genuine or fraud.
tell me if the website is scam website or not
i just checked out moneymakingstreme.com on whois.domaintools.com and they have 2 strikes against them. there are 228 other sites hosted on the same IP and they only registered the domain for 1 year. nov7/09 – nov7/10. i too was considering joining but definitely won’t now. thanks for the info on this blog. i recommend you stay clear of this one.
sorry, the website is moneymakingxtreme.com
Hey there want to know if the sire http://www.heavenvision.com is a scam?
You can use http://ReverseInternet.com/ to check is two websites are related. You can run checks based on IP address, DNS server, Google AdSense ID (which is almost impossible to forge) or Google Analytics ID
Hi
Please have a look http://www.high-interest-deposits.com
they have returns on investment of 20% plus per year if you invest in Azerbaijan
Want to know it its a scam. but all the sites check out and even the bank seem to offer this. so what is th catch?
thanks