Kimstore urges public to fight online fraud

As technology improved and made life easier, so did the ways fraudsters and bad actors could trick people. Hence, Kimstore urged the public — especially those unaware of their personal information — to be careful and not fall for online scams.

During Daily Tribune's online show Gising Na!, Kimstore founder and CEO Kim Lato noted that scammers are creating websites that look like duplicate websites so that the personal information can be inter-exchanged.

She said that some customers depend on a feature called One Time Password or a temporary, secure PIN code sent to people via SMS or e-mail that is valid only for one session.

Lato said several scammers take advantage of this by pretending to be a bank representative and asking for OTPs.

"Since I am an online seller, I have experienced that sometimes someone calls our hotline and says that someone called them just to give the OTP to increase the credit limit," Lato said.

Unfortunately, Lato said these scammers would use the OTP to buy a product from this website. She told the person scammed would receive a notification that they bought a product from this store.

"(It is better too) report (this incident) to the bank (immediately) so that the order can be canceled or report it there to sellers on the website that is not an authorized transaction," Lato said.

Lato also noted that another online shopping scam trend is creating its website on social media platforms to scam people.

For example, some sellers would only delete their stores after making several sales and not give the items to the shoppers. Some would also use social media for advertising their fake website.

When asked about the red flags of a fraudulent website, Lato said it's better to check if there's an "https://" on the first part of the website.

"It is better to see that there is 'https://' on the website, but if there is none, it is better to call the seller for the website's legitimacy so that you can be assured if you want to pursue the purchase there," Lato said.