You may have heard heartwarming stories about how all the animals in community pet shelters have been adopted out during the pandemic by people choosing this time to adopt a furry friend.<\/p>\n
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Unfortunately, scammers are busy looking for clever ways to defraud consumers out of their much-needed cash, and the pandemic is providing opportunities.\u00a0Overall, Fraud.org has seen\u00a0a 79\u00a0percent\u00a0increase from COVID-related complaints from March to April\u00a0alone. And one scam in particular — pet adoption scams — has seen a significant spike.<\/p>\n
For the February-April time period, we have seen a 42\u00a0percent\u00a0jump in complaints\u00a0about\u00a0pet\u00a0adoption\u00a0scams versus the same period in 2019.\u00a0Our colleagues at PetScams.com also report a similar spike in interest, with more than\u00a0twice the number<\/a>\u00a0of visitors to their website\u00a0in April as they had in March.<\/p>\n This spike in pet adoption scams is undoubtedly being driven by the COVID-19\u00a0pandemic. These scams have been around for years, but the current pandemic circumstances are providing the perfect environment for scammers to succeed at this particular scam. Here’s why:<\/p>\n In a typical pet adoption scam, a criminal will create a fake website with a domain name related to a particular breed of dog or cat, potentially combined with words\u00a0like\u00a0\u201cpuppy\u201d or \u201ckitten.\u201d The\u00a0service\u00a0will be advertised\u00a0on classifieds websites, social media, via phishing emails, or by other means to drive traffic.\u00a0The websites tend to have photos of cute animals to entice visitors to reach out to the website owner (who is, in reality, a criminal with no animals to offer).<\/p>\n Consumers who respond to the ads will be instructed to pay\u00a0fees before the animal\u00a0can be shipped.\u00a0These fictitious costs may include \u201cshipping fees,\u201d \u201cinoculations,\u201d\u00a0\u201cquarantine fees,\u201d\u00a0\u201cinsurance,\u201d or even \u201cCOVID-safe shipping crates.\u201d Regardless of the excuse given by the \u201cseller\u201d of the fictitious animal, the aim is always the same: get the victim to continue paying and\/or providing valuable personal information until they either catch on or run out of money.<\/p>\n A complaint we received from a consumer in\u00a0South Carolina is typical of these scams:<\/p>\n \u201c<\/em>We contacted a seller on Craig<\/em>s<\/em>list about a pupp<\/em>y<\/em>\u00a0that she was giving away for free. She lived in Montana so\u00a0<\/em>[she]\u00a0<\/em>would have to ship the dog, which was originally agreed to be only $300. The shipping comp<\/em>any told us that they required $500 more for a crate. Then the next day they claimed the dog was stuck in Florida and we would need to pay an additional amount of $650 for pet insurance<\/em>. \u2026 Once we stopped responding to the shipping company, they threatened [us] with dog abandonment, and the seller was also adamant that we are torturing the puppy.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n To avoid these scams, we suggest the following steps:<\/p>\n If you\u2019ve been on the receiving end of a pet adoption scam or any other coronavirus-related phone call, email, or text message that you think is a scam, we want to hear from you! By filing a complaint at Fraud.org via\u00a0our\u00a0secure online complaint form<\/a>, you can help law enforcement bring scammers to justice. We share complaints with our network of nearly 200 law enforcement and consumer protection agency partners who can and do put fraudsters behind bars.<\/p>\n\n
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