How to Protect Yourself From Fraud

Hi beautiful ladies, and friends I trust you're great. Today, I want to share some important tips on how we can protect ourselves from fraud. Fraudsters are constantly devising new schemes to separate people from their money, and it's essential to be aware of ways criminals defraud people to prevent falling victim. I once heard the saying “You can’t cheat an honest man.” you will agree with me that this particular saying is untrue because honest people are victims of fraud daily; the thing is that honesty alone doesn't protect one from being defrauded.

We need to be aware of ways criminals defraud people. These few precautions can go a long way in protecting us from becoming a victim:

Make sure you keep your personal information safe. You know what inspired me to put this article into writing is that I received one suspicious call today, the caller told me that he was calling from my bank customer care, mentioning my name and some account details, that they were working whatever! Haha you know he said a particular code would be sent to my phone, I should please call it for him immediately I sense that he's a scammer who tried to defraud me so I ended the call and blocked the number.

Keep your credit cards or checkbook safe, it shouldn't be accessible because if someone steals it they can obtain more than enough personal information and can even assume your identity and steal your money, they can withdraw money from your account, obtain loans in your name, charge things to your credit card accounts, and you might even be arrested for a crime you didn't commit. To protect yourself be careful with your personal documents, including your National identity card, Bank Verification Number, checkbooks, Driver's license, Social security card, & International passport, etc.

Refuse to give out your personal or financial information to others (except if there's a legitimate reason why they should have it). Always be alert, do you know that once someone I used to flow with very well on this platform asked me to give him my national identification number (NIN) that he wanted to buy something here in Nigeria and the site demanded such, I told him that it's impossible because that's my identity, he can use it to do whatever he wants and I'll be the one to bare the consequences.

Give out your credit card number only when you want to buy something with it, stop throwing your paperwork that contains your personal information, it's wise to shred or burn it, this includes your brokerage or bank statements, old credit card driver’s licenses, and passports. This is because dumpster divers root through garbage searching for such information. Also, destroy any unsolicited credit card applications that you receive in your mail so that someone else might not misuse the information about you.

Many frauds usually promise unrealistically high returns on investment. They will tell you to invest $5 and get $50 in a few days, a get-rich-quick scam and you have to bring others to grow faster, yeah a pyramid scheme. These scams come in many variations, the usual one we know is for an investor to recruit other investors for which the recruiter will receive a commission.

Another is chain letters work, you will be sending money to people at the top list with the promise that you will receive thousands of dollars when your name also reaches the top. The truth is that pyramid schemes always collapse because it is not possible to continue recruiting new members.

Let me explain this in simple mathematics, if a group of 3 people launches a Ponzi scheme, each of them will recruit 3 more persons and the number of recruits will become 9. If they, in turn, each recruit 3, that would mean 27 more, and When recruitment reaches the 13th level there will be almost two million people who would have to recruit more than four million others! By this time the promoters of the Ponzi scheme know that a saturation point is near so they will take all the money and disappear. You will probably lose your hard-earned cash, not only that, those you've recruited will be on your neck trying to recover their lost money.

Always recall that for you to make money on Ponzi another person has to lose money. A cautionary warning is this: Don't be quick to believe the testimonies from others and advertising claims, do not think this one is different, because it's not, always know that no one is in the business of sharing secrets to make you rich or give away money. Each time someone claims to have special knowledge that can make me a fortune, I normally ask myself why doesn't he/she use it to enrich himself. Why is he wasting his time trying to sell it to others?

Another tactic that victimizes Many is you will be told that you've won a contest or prize, but you have to pay a certain token amount before you can claim it, they can call you and tell you that you've won 500 grand but you need to pay 10 percentage of that amount as a further processing fee. If you sent the money you won't receive anything in return, it's a scam, think of it, why didn't they remove their so-called percentage from the money and send you the remaining amount? And how come you've won a contest you didn't enter? Always use your common sense

Be very careful while doing business with others, because swindlers know how to win the confidence of others. They know very well how to make their victims trust in them. Both honest & dishonest sellers know how to market themselves, well, I didn't say you should mistrust everyone but a healthy suspicion is very important in protecting yourself from fraud. Always look for the telly tale signs of fraud, which are first when the offer is too good to be true and second if the seller is rushing you into making a decision.

These offers abound on the internet, don't allow this criminal to defraud you anonymously. Blocked spam messages on your email, they normally offer too good to be true values of goods and services, immediately you send money for the goods, you will receive nothing. If you do, it will be worth almost nothing, do not buy anything from spammers. Although some telemarketing is legit be careful because each year they cheat people billions of dollars, so be smart.

Recalled my experience, a swindler may pose as one of the bank reps or card protection agency or claim to call from a company you have an account with. In this case, you have very good reason to be suspicious, don't give out your information. I'll advise you to visit your bank or company in person in cases like this because the good policy is that you shouldn't give your credit card number or any other personal data to a stranger who calls you. Just tell the person you don't do business on the phone and end the call. It's needless to engage with someone who wants to defraud you.

Before making any major investment get the details in writing, and check the company well likewise the salesperson through some independent agency, documents all the contracts you've signed and it should be in terms of the investment and promises made. Finally, no investment is risk-free as such an agreement should state the responsibilities and duties of each person in case the business fails.

Being aware of these precautions and using common sense can go a long way in protecting yourself from fraud.

Please note the images are my Idea using AI Adobe Photoshop to create them.