Common scams faced by the gaming community 

The gaming community is an active and thriving space where you meet a lot of enthusiastic and passionate gamers of all ages and scammers are actively looking at taking advantage of this community. There are tons of fraud stories that are being posted on gaming forums daily let us take a look at a few of them.


Virtual bucks generator

Here scammers offer custom software that generates virtual currency for a game. The virtual buck’s generators are mostly malware. You get scammed here twice. The First way you get scammed is the payment you made for software is only a small amount but your credit card info is stolen and you are charged for a lot more than $10 you paid for the software. 

The second way is the malware steals your identity and scammers take out multiple credit cards in your name and your credit is ruined. Since the people who are scammed are young there are not aware of identity theft until years later.

Fake sellers

Gamers love their in-games skin and weapons and are ready to pay a decent amount for them. Many scammers take advantage of this and list these skins and weapons at an attractive price. They ask the gamers to pay half the amount before the accounts with the weapons are shared. When the payment is made they just disappear. 

This problem is so bad that most gaming groups ban scammers and have a list of scammers but the scammers keep popping up with new accounts.

Impersonation

Here the scammers impersonate a friend of a victim who is less active. Then the scammer tells the victim that this is a new account and asks to “borrow” the victim’s in-game items or personal info. 

This happens often and causes a lot of trust issues after the scam takes place as the victim loses trust in general from such a bad experience.

How do you avoid these scams?  Follow these guidelines

  1. Don’t trust too good to be true offers
  2. Avoid buying in-game items from external websites
  3. Check the website where you are buying for reviews
  4. Use a digital escrow platform like Vouch when purchasing from an unknown party
  5. When a friend's activity seems suspicious talk to them outside the game on other channels to confirm if they are the ones you are talking to.

What is digital escrow?

Digital Escrow is the use of a third party account, during a transaction, which holds the money deposited by the person who is purchasing any product/service until the seller fulfills the terms of the agreement. The transacting parties are supervised by the escrow company.

How does Digital Escrow save you from online frauds in India? 

Vouch’s Digital Escrow service is a transparent way for buyers and sellers to build trust and secure a clean transfer of product and payment. Buyers can feel assured that they will be fairly compensated in a timely manner, and buyers will feel confident that their order will be delivered as expected and on schedule. If you ever come across a fraudster asking for OTP, asking you to scan a QR code, or asking you to click on phishing links, you can simply say no and ask him/her to proceed with the transaction through Vouch. 

Vouch Digital Escrow uses a non-interest-bearing escrow account for all transactions in India and keeps you updated and informed at every step of the transaction process till the end. Vouch’s professionals are always available to assist you with all queries that you may have during the entire transaction process. There is no scope for deceit or fraud since the payments, shipping, delivery, and execution are carried out under the honest and watchful eyes of the Vouch’s professionals. With Vouch, any business transaction becomes transparent, uncomplicated, and hassle-free.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This is Fraud Story #39. Check back here for more fraud chronicles and scams that you can protect yourself from.

Safety is not just about protecting your credit or debit card number. It's about having control of your money till you've delivered the product or service you contracted to! 

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note: This is a good-faith initiative to educate the world about how to avoid frauds like these. Do you have a fraud that you would like to report? Please write to us at letstalk@iamvouched.com