Valentine’s Day can be a holiday filled with love, romance, and cute flirty messages. However, scammers will find a way to break your hearts and bank accounts on a holiday that’s supposed to be about love. They have come up with a scam where they will send you greeting cards claiming to be your secret admirer or a friend/family member. They will also instruct you to open up a link within the greeting card, but doing so can leak your personal and financial information. Here is why you need to beware of the Valentine’s Day greeting card scam.

How This Valentine’s Day Greeting Card Scam Works

Scammers will send their victims out greeting cards via a phishing email, claiming that they are from a secret admirer or someone you know. It then asks you to click on the link emailed to you so that you can view the card. However, once you open the card it downloads malware onto your device that steals your personal and financial information without you realizing it.

There are some instances where it will also ask you to fill out your personal information on the site for a variety of reasons. Sometimes, the scammer will claim that you are going to receive a gift with your e-card, so they need to verify it’s you and needs your address to send the package. They also claim they need your financial information so that you can help pay a small shipping fee to get your gift.

Other times, they will claim that they need to verify it’s you and need your personal information to even open the card. Either way, the only reasons a scammer would want this information would be to commit identity fraud under your name and to drain your bank account. 

How to Avoid This Valentine’s Day Greeting Card Scam

• Don’t send anyone your personal or financial information over a greeting card website or email.
• If the sender claims to be a certain family member, friend, or significant other, ask them over the phone or in-person if they sent you that card.
• If the sender claims to be from a “secret admirer” then most likely that person is a scammer.
• Do not click any links that are sent to you via email, unless it’s from an official company’s email address, such as “hallmark.com” or your friend’s email with no typos.
• If you aren’t sure whether or not the greeting card is legit, research the company that claims to be providing you with the greeting card.
• Reverse search the email address to see if the email that sent you the greeting card is real.
• Don’t click on any attached files within the email.
• Report any scam to the FTC along with the scam email address so that they can help you catch the scammer.

And Lastly… Reverse Search Their Email with Social Catfish

At Social Catfish, we want to help you verify the identities of those who might seem suspicious to you. If you have their name, email address, phone number, social media username, or image, you can reverse search and see who the suspected person was that you’ve been in contact with if you think you’ve been a victim of this Valentine’s Day greeting card scam.

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