I do a lot of my shopping online, it was during a bout of online shopping that I - almost - got sucked into the Great Vacuum of Consumer Doom.
I have been shopping around for a while for a Duraflame electric heater that has realistic-looking "fake flames". This one looks pretty good to me (YouTube video):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SOVIrVhktM
I want to put this thing - or something like it (suggestions are always appreciated!) - into my fireplace because my fireplace smokes when I light an actual fire in there, plus I want the "look" without all of the mess.
Anyway, I found this exact item on the "Best Buy" website (Best Buy is a discount-type chain. I don't know if it just here in California, or all over the country - but this is what Best Buy is.). The price was good, I was delighted to find this low-priced "deal" on this item.
Since I had purchased items from Best Buy many times in the past at good prices, and with no problems - I - almost! - decided to make the purchase. . .
HOWEVER in looking at the URL (always a good idea to check the URL of a website each and every time you buy something online), I noticed that the URL (the series of letters and number that appear in the window at the top of your browser - for example, as I am writing this post on women.rv the first part of the URL always looks like this: http://womenrv.com).
The URL on the website I was looking at had nothing to do with Best Buy.
In looking at the URL for this alleged "Best Buy" website, the whole page was crisp and clean, totally official-looking just the way it should be, with a clean and crisp image of the Best Buy logo prominently displayed in the exact place the Best Buy logo is always displayed on each page of their websites:
Except for one small problem.
Er, no. Let me carefully rephrase that: Except for one Major Bleeping GIANT Freaking Problem:
Instead of the URL being "https:www.bestbuy.com" (as it should have been), the actual URL was "rip-off-scam.com". (No, it wasn't actually rip-off-scam.com - but I'm not going to post what the actual URL was on here).
I thought, hrm. How very interesting.
So I put this heater in my cart, just to see what the URL of the cart might be.
LOL.
Needless to say, the URL of the cart didn't have anything - at all - to do with Best Buy either, so if I had actually put my payment information in there (name, address, shipping address, email address, phone number, credit card number, bank account number, whatever) there is NO doubt in my mind that I would right now be in a MAJOR world of hurt.
Not only would this outfit have had my credit card information, it would also have had a Big Chunk of my personal information as well (because you need to put in shipping/contact information when buying stuff from a website that you don't buy from all of the time).
SO.
I closed this browser window, opened a new one, and then I moseyed on over to the actual Best Buy website, (you know, the one that actually has bestbuy.com as the URL) and reported that this scam website was using the Best Buy logo to sell stuff.
Or, probably more likely, it wasn't actually selling stuff - it was just gathering people's personal information and banking/credit card information for scamming (identity theft) purposes.
The person I contacted at Best Buy was very appreciative, and said that Best Buy would have the website shut down.
I know that this is kind of a long-winded story, but this just happened this morning, so I thought I would pass it along.
Be careful where you shop online, and always be extra-careful where you put in your personal information.
It's a jungle out there, ladies!!
Please feel free to share this information with your friends, or other social media outlets you might belong to.
You all have a great day.
Anne
if I ever join the current way of shopping I will hopefully remember some of what I read