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August 5, 2010 | Volume 4, Issue 8 | www.sdchamber.org | contact us
By Randy Abrams, Director of Technical Education, ESET LLC Imagine you go to the grocery store. You select the items you wish to purchase and bring them to the cashier. As the cashier rings you up, she reaches behind the counter, grabs another item you never asked for, and rings it up too as she puts it into your shopping bag. True, if you tell them you don’t want that item they will remove it from the bag and from the bill, but does this seem like an honest way to do business? Not all of the online scams involve activity that is currently classified as criminal. Not all of the online scams are done by fly-by-night operations. Even using trusted websites to do online shopping requires you to be very careful and make sure you read everything. If you use Yahoo Travel or Travelocity, the agency behind Yahoo Travel, to book a flight, when you have made your selections and click on the button that says “Continue with Flight Only”, (assuming you didn’t want their hotel recommendations) that is when, like a crooked cashier, they try to sneak travel insurance past you. Once you have priced your flights and see the total cost, then when you click the button that says “Continue with Flight Only” the deliberate deception takes place. The portion of the screen where it shows that you have now opted into travel insurance is neither at the top nor the bottom of the screen, except for those running a very high resolution. You have to look carefully to see that the total has been changed and that Travelocity and Yahoo travel have tossed travel insurance into your shopping basket. Vendors such as Alaska Airlines, Expedia, Orbitz, and others will offer you travel insurance, but the choice is not pre-selected to “yes” as it is with Travelocity and Yahoo Travel. There is a way you can fight back when it comes to these deceptive vendor practices - you can file a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission. You do not need to have lost money to file a complaint. The FTC website at www.ftc.gov has a complaint form. It is through the involvement of citizens filing complaints that we reduce deceptive sales and advertising practices. Another route one might take is to file a complaint with the State Insurance Commissioner, since it is insurance that is being sold using deceptive practices. As always, if you wish to submit questions or comments to “Ask the Expert” please feel free to send them to askeset@eset.com.
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ESET Tech Tip: If it Walks Like a Crook…