Top 15 PayPal Scams Today

Gannicus Oliver  - Tech Journalist
Last updated: January 15, 2024
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It seems PayPal scams are not disappearing anytime soon. You must learn to spot and avoid them, and this article will help you achieve exactly that.

THE TAKEAWAYS

PayPal is one of the leading and popular platforms, allowing fast and secure money transactions. Unfortunately, it is on the hit list of scammers, making the site extremely risky for users. These scams mostly appear as official emails from the platform. Consequently, many people get victimized and lose valuable information and money. This guide elaborates on the top PayPal scams you may encounter and the effective ways to spot and avoid them.

PayPal is one of the most popular online payment systems worldwide and an excellent option for sending and receiving money. Its worldwide fame makes it a very attractive platform for cybercriminals and hackers, who keep trying to get a share of clueless or inexperienced users.

It is possible that at some point, you had fallen into the trap and ended up being a victim of a PayPal scam. If so, you have learned the lesson.

Common scams on PayPal – Quick list

While you’ll find the detailed list of most online scams related to PayPal in this guide later, for now, to give you a quick idea about what’s wrong there, here is a quick list of the most common PayPal scams.

  • Problems with PayPal account – the scammer sends false warning about PayPal account closure or blocked payments.
  • Fake messages seeking advanced payments – the scammer lures users by offering huge lottery or selling fake products against some advance payments.
  • Invalid shipping address issue – posing as a buyer, the scammer aims at stealing money from the victim’s PayPal either by falsely claiming false that the ordered product never arrived.
  • Zero-day operating kits – the scammer may use sophisticated techniques, such as vulnerability exploits or abusing legit but stolen email accounts, to steal money.
  • – it’s a common PayPal scam where the scammer seeks money as donations for fake charities.