5 Online Scams Google Warns To Look Out For

Scammers gotta be scamming. Getty Images Whether it's scam text messages, fake ads, unsolicited social media messages, or just plain old phishing emails, the methods used by cybercriminals to hook their targets are getting more sophisticated and believable. That's the upshot of a report released Wednesday by Google ahead of its Safety Engineering Center's inaugural Scams Summit. The research pointed to recent Federal Trade Commission data showing that reported fraud losses jumped 25% to $12.5 billion last year. Experts say that's partly due to new technologies, including those powered by artificial intelligence, which are helping cybercriminals boost both the believability and quantity of their scams. To make matters worse, Google says plenty of people still don't know what the red flags of a scam are. "Scammers are more effective and act without fear of punishment when people are uninformed about fraud and scam tactics," Google said in the report. Need some help spotting online s ... Read full article.