Krista clicked on one link, which led to some incredibly unfortunate events. Fashion giant Vinted urges caution when shopping.
Helsinki Krista25, was to lose almost everything in an instant.
– It’s sad when you can’t trust almost anything these days. Or that everything should be suspected, he says.
Krista had just introduced the flea application Vinted, which landed in Finland with a lot of fanfare at the end of last year. The operating logic of the platform is based on transactions between consumers.
Registered users can put their clothes and accessories on sale, which other users can browse based on search terms.
Krista took pictures of the dress she wanted to sell. He uploaded the pictures to his sales profile on the app.
Soon it started to happen.
Something is wrong
Within a few hours, Krista received a message from the “buyer”. A person using a Finnish name sent her a private message in Finnish saying that the dress had been bought.
The giant of recycled fashion, Vinted, has achieved huge popularity in Europe and North America. Criminals have also found their way to the platform. PDO
According to Krista, the message looked official, and the user’s location appeared to be Great Britain. This still had a Finnish address.
– Around five in the evening, I decided that I would now accept the payment. I tried to google a bit to see if such a message is real, and the view looked just right in my opinion, he says.
Krista decided to click on the link. The click led him to a view where he could log in to the selected payment service. Krista confirmed the payment function through the online banking view, and the payment seemed to go through.
However, he quickly realized that something was wrong.
“Nothing can be done”
Krista ordered to calculate her security limits, but after doing this, notifications popped up on the phone screen about payment confirmation requests, which she was not doing herself. Krista did not confirm them.
– Within 15 minutes I had lowered the security limits, called the lockout service and told my father that I have to go to the bank right away, he recounts the events.
The bank found out that the damage happened in time.
– I was told that there was 1,769.36 euros in the margin, and they (officials) can’t do anything about it.
Users can delete the private messages they sent on Vinted, which is why the scammer had time to destroy some of the evidence. However, Krista managed to take a screenshot of the scene when the scam happened. Reader’s photo
Krista says that the scammer managed to delete the messages from the conversation before she could take a screenshot of them.
A criminal complaint has been filed about the incident. Krista does not appear by her real name due to the sensitivity of the matter.
Iltalehti has seen the criminal report and excerpts from Krista’s account transactions.
The first reaction was shame
Krista says that the spectrum of emotions following the incident has been wide, and the mind has been on the ground.
– I’m usually very careful about these things and I’ve avoided nasty things (scams) before. So the first reaction was probably shame and terribly embarrassed that how could it be that I didn’t realize this.
– But when I heard how common these (scams) are, I just realized that they (cybercriminals) have become so cunning. Everything looks really authentic.
According to Krista, the main reason that she fell for the scam was that she did not know the working mechanisms of the application properly.
– I thought it was the Vinted application, which has been talked about a lot. Also, it (on the screen) read this “girl’s” name and Finnish address, and everything seemed so real, so I just thought, maybe this is how it works.
Krista, who fell victim to a scam, wants to warn other users of online flea markets about scams. Illustration image. Adobe Stock/AOP
Krista criticizes Vinted for not clearly showing how the buying and selling processes are carried out safely when the application is put into use. He received no warnings about scammers.
– I am going to say in the feedback to Vinted that it would be great if you could show some pictures of what it looks like if someone is actually buying the product. When there was none, how could I have known that it (the message) was not correct?
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Criticism of Vinted
Operating in 21 countries, Vinted is Europe’s most popular recycled fashion app. It had over 80 million registered users in 2022.
With the huge market, scammers have also found their way onto the platform.
Among other things, a British newspaper has warned about scammers nesting on the international recycled fashion giant and similar platforms The Suna cybersecurity website Cybernews and European Consumer Centre.
Also a CORQ website aimed at influencers has rooted app that, according to many users, Vinted has not done enough to prevent various scams from happening. According to some, the application would also have unreasonably blocked users.
The fashion giant itself has also warned about phishing and fraudulent messages circulating in the application on their website.
Vinted commented
Iltalehti reached out to Vinted’s communications department to comment on what happened and the criticism it received.
Vinted says that the platform strives to eradicate fraud and illegal activities by, among other things, preventing users’ attempts to create multiple accounts, warning users when sharing personal information, and automating the removal of suspicious activity and content.
– Fraudsters try to get users to make payments outside the platform. For this reason, we encourage users to operate only in the application and not to make payments through external applications, writes the company’s communication.
The company reminds that personal data should never be disclosed to other users, for example through private messages, and Vinted “never asks the buyer to use the seller’s email address or phone number” during the purchase process.
Vinted urges users to exercise caution. Personal data must not be disclosed to other users under any circumstances. Illustration image. PDO
Communication is also advised to evaluate the reliability of an unknown user based on the reviews he has received from other users.
Vinted did not comment on users’ criticism of the level of consumer protection. You can, for example, delete messages from conversations, so in cases of fraud, for example, you may be able to destroy evidence.
Vinted also did not comment on the criticism received by the application that the instructions and warnings about numerous scams circulating on the platform were not clear enough when joining or using the application.
The number of scams is increasing
Krista is not the only one who has become a victim of crime at online flea markets. The number of scams and their companies has grown dramatically year after year, both at online flea markets and on other social media platforms.
Scams are becoming more and more professional and it can be difficult to recognize them as fraudulent.
In 2021, 2,500 reports were made to the police about online scams in the financial sector by. Finns lost about 47 million euros in scams.
Some of the cases remain hidden crimes, i.e. they never come to the attention of the police.
REMEMBER
This is how the police instructs:
– The recipient’s bank IDs are never needed for money transfers. The account number is enough.
– Do not give your online banking credentials or passwords to anyone. Do not give your personal information to strangers.
– If your friend asks for your personal information online, approach him another way to make sure that the sender is really him.
– If you have passed on your bank ID, notify your bank immediately and file a criminal report with the police.
– Warn your loved ones about scams.