YORK, Pa. — I'm sure we would all love some extra money this holiday season.
And gift cards are great to give as a gift, but it's unlikely a big company is giving you one for nothing.
On day 5 of our "12 Scams of Christmas," why free gift cards will likely cost you your data.
I love my Kohl's Cash as much as the next gal, but something about this email seemed off.
A free $100 dollar gift card for just opening an email? Scroll down a bit and it states you need to answer a survey.
If it's actually from Kohl's and I already shop there, so what's the big deal?
Let's just see if it is actually from the retailer. Check the sender and nope.
That's definitely not Kohl's.
Emails like this can trick people, especially when they phrase something like "We want to give you a free gift card for being a loyal customer during the pandemic!"
Most of the time, it's a phishing scheme where scammers pose as a legitimate company to get your information.
And sometimes, you may even get some sort of gift card, but it will cost you in other ways, like a shipping fee or a company re-selling your information.
The Federal Trade Commission has reported a major increase in gift card scams over the past few years.
The bad guy's number one target? Is well...Target. People lost more than $35 million in Target gift card scams just in the first nine months of 2021.
There are plenty of different variations of gift card scams.
So, if you don't get a gift card in your stocking or in a card from grandma, it's probably a scam.
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