Top holiday scams shoppers should watch for ahead of Black Friday

6 hours ago7 min read4 comments

As the holiday shopping season accelerates toward Black Friday, a perfect storm of technological advancement and consumer psychology is creating unprecedented opportunities for digital scammers. Generative AI tools have democratized fraud, enabling criminals to produce frighteningly believable deepfakes, polished phishing emails, and cloned e-commerce sites that flood inboxes and social feeds.The urgency is palpable; a recent Norton report revealed that 62% of Americans are likely to make an immediate purchase upon seeing a holiday deal online, an impulse that leaves little room for scrutinizing the red flags that once distinguished scams from legitimate offers. This isn't just about stolen credit card numbers—it's a fundamental erosion of digital trust.The top threats manifest in several sophisticated forms. Lookalike digital storefronts, which use URLs differing from legitimate sites by a single letter, are being spun up at an alarming rate using large language models and autonomous AI agents that can generate product descriptions, write backend code, and create fake logos.Amazon, Temu, and luxury brands are among the most impersonated, and the consequences are real: a Mastercard survey found 72% of shoppers buy from unfamiliar websites, with nearly one in five experiencing non-delivery and 16% receiving counterfeit goods. Meanwhile, a wave of fake holiday deal phishing emails, now perfected by AI to remove the grammatical errors that were once a telltale sign, closely mimic retailer communications with offers of steep discounts or fake refund notices.Delivery and shipping scam texts exploit package-tracking anxiety, with messages demanding extra payments or even Social Security numbers, having already cost people $470 million in 2024 according to FTC data. Perhaps most insidiously, deepfake social media ads use AI cloning tools to mimic celebrity voices and faces—McAfee researchers uncovered a deepfake of Taylor Swift promoting bogus Le Creuset cookware—to drive traffic to counterfeit stores.Even the perennial gift card scam has evolved, with fraudsters stealing card numbers from physical packaging and draining funds upon activation, a significant risk given that 72% of consumers plan to purchase gift cards this season. The bottom line for personal finance security is to adopt a stance of proactive skepticism: verify deals by going directly to a retailer's official site, be wary of any unsolicited payment request, and always inspect gift card packaging for tampering. In an era where AI can perfectly replicate trust, the most valuable financial habit this holiday season is a healthy dose of suspicion.

#holiday scams

#phishing

#deepfakes

#generative ai

#lookalike websites

#gift card fraud

#featured

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