Who protects you if you get scammed while buying online?

Many scams

In mid-May 2018, Mr. Vu Dinh Chien (member of the Ornamental Plants Association of Yen Thanh District) reported to Nghe An Newspaper reporters that he was scammed out of 3 million VND when buying ornamental plants through Facebook. According to his statement, when he went online, he saw a Facebook account named "Que Hoa Lan" selling orchids. Being a fan of this flower, Mr. Chien chose and decided to order some plants to take care of. The price that the owner of this Facebook account gave for those flowers was 3 million VND, and at the same time asked him to transfer money first before shipping the goods.

Facebook user Chien Vudinh accused of being tricked into buying ornamental plants online.

Believing this person, Mr. Chien transferred the full amount of money. However, he said that after receiving the money, the online seller blocked him on Facebook and his phone number. Up to now, it has been nearly 20 days but the goods have not yet arrived, and the seller is always in a state of...uncontactable.

Because he was so upset, Mr. Chien shared this story on his personal Facebook page and surprisingly many other people commented that they were also in a similar situation, among them were people who were also scammed by the Facebook account owner "Que Hoa Lan" with the amount of up to tens of millions of Dong.

In addition to the fear of being "cheated" after transferring money like Mr. Chien, many people also "laugh and cry" because the quality and design of the goods received are completely different from what was seen in the photo when buying. Nearly a year ago, in July 2017, Nguyen Thi Ha (born in 1991), residing in Nghi Phong commune (Nghi Loc) was summoned by the police due to signs of committing fraud and appropriating property on the social network Facebook.

At the investigation agency, Ha confessed to using 3 different Facebook accounts to conduct fraudulent transactions on social networks, aiming to appropriate property. One account named “Thanh Ngoc” was used to post sales information, and two other accounts were used to purchase goods.

Subject Ha at the police station. Photo: Contributor

When someone buys from the account “Thanh Ngoc”, Ha asks the buyer to transfer money first via bank and then send the goods. If the buyer agrees, the subject will continue to use the remaining Facebook accounts to buy goods from other people with lower value and quality, at the same time, take that person’s bank account number and transfer it to his buyer on the Facebook account “Thanh Ngoc”, asking the buyer to transfer money.

Once the buyer has transferred the money, the subject will meet directly with the seller who transacted through Facebook to buy the goods and the difference in money. The goods with lower value and poor quality will be sent back to the buyer in the account "Thanh Ngoc", the subject will keep the difference.

"Many people often come to ask to buy goods from my Facebook account, because the same clothing item, I often sell on social networks at a lower price than other places. I often use many phone numbers to contact and transact with buyers and sellers. When customers have comments about the quality of goods and prices, I will block their Facebook accounts and cancel their phone numbers" - Nguyen Thi Ha confessed. Using this trick, the subject conducted buying and selling activities with many victims in many provinces and cities across the country, with the amount of money appropriated estimated at tens of millions of VND.

These are two specific examples among many cases of online shopping fraud. In fact, many online shopping scams also take on different forms such as buyers being delivered missing goods, damaged goods that are not returned, late delivery, order cancellation without reason or sometimes goods being swapped or replaced during the shipping process.

Be alert to avoid falling into traps

It is undeniable that technology has changed the way and habits of shopping. From housewives, office workers or anyone, they can save time shopping, when they just need to sit in one place, choose countless items offered online, just click and wait for delivery to your door. However, online shopping also has many potential risks.

When transacting online, buyers only see images, which may only be symbolic images and not accurately reflect the real product being sold. Furthermore, online sellers can create multiple virtual accounts at the same time to trade, chat and sell. If they do not really thoroughly research the seller, online buyers can become “prey” to be exploited. Even when they discover fraud, they will have difficulty tracking down and identifying the subject who committed the act of deceiving them.

Furthermore, online sales management is still a loophole. With just one social network account, anyone can post a sale without any agency checking or controlling the quality or origin of the goods.

On the other hand, when buyers report the behavior to the authorities, the problem of checking and handling also encounters many difficulties because the registration of account names is often not true, or there may be many groups of people performing the behavior but the location of the behavior is not in the same area. In this case, the subjects took advantage of the superiority of the Internet, which is not limited in space, to cover up the behavior.

When the regulations on online shopping still have many loopholes, the world of online buying and selling is bustling but buyers are not fully protected, the only way is for users to be smart, choose a reputable shopping address, clearly disclose the address, seller's identity, clear and transparent payment methods. Must have a firm grasp of information on transaction terms and conditions, especially terms on warranty, return, refund, delivery...

In addition, you need to learn carefully about the product before buying, such as its origin, features and feedback from previous customers. Be especially careful with virtual websites, unlicensed websites that require too specific and detailed personal information of customers; this can be a form of information theft when customers are completely negligent and not vigilant...

Article 139 of the Penal Code stipulates the crime of fraud and appropriation of property as follows:

“Anyone who, by fraudulent means, appropriates another person's property worth from VND 2 million to under VND 50 million, or under VND 2 million but causing serious consequences, or has been administratively sanctioned for the act of appropriation or has been convicted of the crime of appropriation of property, whose criminal record has not been expunged, but who continues to violate, shall be subject to non-custodial reform for up to 3 years or imprisonment from 6 months to 3 years.”