If you are playing Farmville on Facebook, beware of the 'surveys' and other fun things. There's an article in Time magazine about and Farmville and apparently some of the fun things like....'Which Desperate Housewife are you', 'Which Star Trek commander are you?'.
To go to these survey/games you are required to provide lots of information, and in many cases, your cell phone number. Apparently some people provided those cell numbers and inadvertently signed up for something that billed those cell numbers including some of the scams that call your cell phone, and when you answer, an 8XX number starts billing you per minute. Is that even legal? Well, probably not here, but if the numbers are calling from non-US numbers is it legal?
Yes and dont ever do the sign up for the free lap top. I did simply to check out what the scam was...........I signed up for some free stuff knowing full well what I was doing just to check it out. Well...............some of it is not free. They bill you the one dollar and send you the free stuff along with the next months (not free) and bill you for that as well. You have to then call them and get it reverses. Although in some cases I was told to keep the product as they could not put it back into their inventory, some said that I could keep it for 20 dollars instead of 85 dollars and that was a good deal but beware. Know what you are getting into. Look at your credit card statement and make the cancel phone calls. You can get some great deals IF you are aware and follow through. Some things I did return as they were not worth the price to keep them or depending on the attitude of the customer service people. I managed to get quite a bit of free stuff but it was a pain making the calls. The computer though, well I got all the way through to the last page of requirements and it bombed out on me and so (well what do you know) did not get the computer in the end haha. So much for experimenting. Do not go for the free shipping sign up either, on your next purchase..........(of whatever) it signs you up for all kinds of stuff you are not going to realize you signed up for. I dont know how they can get away with it either.
I've stopped doing surveys, etc on facebook due to their pulling information from your facebook account---I ignore requests from others on facebook when they "send" things as well due to that always pulling info from your account...
When will people learn....when you send your information out there, somebody is going to use it.
Anybody calls me, I tell 'em I don't sign up for anything over the phone. Send me the information. Surveys....I tell 'em I don't do surveys and hang up. Out there in cyberspace, same thing. I may miss out on the occasional deal, but so far my name has not been used by anyone else but me. And in this day and age, who in the world would send their credit card # out there to just anybody?
I actually got a call from an inmate at the Ohio State Penitentary wanting me to except his call, and the charges were going to be reversed. I would have thought it was a bad joke, but the operator preceeded this idiot's call. Apparently somebody is accepting this guy's phonecalls.
Did you see Dr. Phil recently? Some woman lost $167,000 to men she talked to on the internet. And she had sent her money out there more than once, without checking on these men. Unbelievable.
I don't do surveys either. I'm still trying to get rid of the phone calls from signing on with Google Voice. It's been quiet the past few days, I'm not sure if its because of the holiday weekend or if they are finally going to leave me alone. It sure has been a pleasure not having a ringing phone.
I do play around on Farmville but tend to forget about my garden until my plants wilt....grrr!
The Facebook scams are aimed at the young, and not the old for a nice change. One gal said that her daughter gave out her cell phone number to take one of the quizzes, and got a bunch of 'free' ringtones, etc. Unfortunately, she also signed up for more stuff at $19.95 per month without realizing it. Another gal said that her kid was on the cell phone downloading stuff and her bill was over $300.
I like the Farmville game on Facebook, but I when I got one of those quizzes and one of the preliminary questions asked for my cell phone, and home address, etc I closed it out and didn't try again.
it isn't just facebok - the same thing can happen on almost everything you visit - i was checking on a phone number for someone my Dad wanted to find - and on my next phone bill was a 9.99 charge for something i did not sign up for - at least not knowingly lol - needless to say i had the charge taken off and gave the phone company a piece of my mind for allowing a third partly to use them to scam me.
whims, I'm surprised that you got your money back. Seems like the phone companies are major parties to these scams that bring in a lot of revenue for them.
I agree about the phone companys - I moved this summer and changed to ATT phone service. When my phone was hooked up - Before I had the number to give to others - I was getting twenty to thirty calls a day from third parties that ATT had given my number to BEFORE they gave it to me! I called and raised hell about it - No one but my kids, my mom, and sister have my cell number. That is strictly used for immediate family only. I never give out the number.
I go to facebook but do not do the games and surveys or anything else that says I have to "share" my information with others - Notta. No way. Not gonna do it. I use facebook to keep in touch with, and share pictures, with family that live far away. That's it. Seems like everyone is on the 'lets scam anyone we can' road - and the ways they are doing it are SO sneaky!
I don't mind doing the surveys. I'm just wise enough to not use my real name, address, phone number, mother's maiden name, favorite pet, school name, identifying marks, any # related to me and other info like that. I always use names like: Taras Bulba, Peter Pan, Roger Daltry, George Bush. . .. Stuff like that. I have never had any trouble with them. For some reason. . . . .
