Online fraud – learn how it works and how to avoid it

Online fraud is now more than ever a way that hackers explore in order to make easy money. Thus, they try to mislead users into clicking fake ads or even hijack the users that click on legitimate ads.

What is online fraud?

Well, according to the Collins Dictionary, ”Fraud is the crime of gaining money or financial benefits by a trick or by lying”. Which means that fraudsters try to do the same things, online.

In order to succeed, they just search for the users that might fall into their trap. So, they either show misleading ads, that drive users on scam sites, or try to take advantage of the already existing ads.

In fact, they try to hijack the legitimate ads, in order to make users pay for something they will never get.

Moreover, some other times, they trick users to install some dedicated software solutions. Using the data, attackers steal the online credentials and access victims’ bank accounts. Afterwards, they take advantage of the users’ money.

Also, attackers try to convince users install a piece of software that blocks the access of the owners to their own files.

Then, they ask for a ransomware, in order for users to regain access to their important files or folders.

So, there are many ways fraudsters might make users fall in their trap.

Learn how to avoid it

Nobody wants to become a victim of online fraudsters. But, in order to do this, we should be informed.

Now, that we know what online fraud means and how it works, let’s see what we can do to deal with it.

1. One thing would be to block ad requests from unreliable websites or from all websites, as you wish. Thus, the requests will be sent to denied addresses. As a result, they will return an empty response. So, the requests will not be sent at all. This way, you can save internet traffic and improve the page loading time.
2. But ads use parameters on websites to show. So, any browser should change these to hide the ads.
3. Images could be a problem, as there is no text or just a misleading text name behind them. So, the system should scan any pages’ code, so that it can remove the ads on them. The same should apply to links and scripts.
4. As advertisers track any user’s online behaviour in order to show them further ads, a solution would be to block those trackers.
5. It is the same about social media trackers, which follow users’ behaviour so that it can show personalise, intrusive and annoying ads, afterwards.
6. Data trackers are also a dangerous thing as companies use data to see and analyse which pages users visit, which links they click, their searches etc. So we should avoid these, too.

Although it might seem difficult, anyone can avoid these threats. As long as you decide to get the help of an ad blocker. Ad Guardian Plus is here to help you, as it can do all the things mentioned above and keep you away from online fraudsters.