The common misconception about online charity and online charity scams

There seems to be quite the misconception about charity scams. In fact most people don't even realize that it is a scam in most cases. Just because it has a picture of the red cross and a real phone number, it doesn't mean that it is legit.

Unbelieveably, charity scams are on the rise. And a huge rise at that. Ever since the September 11 disaster happened, these scams have multiplied by over 20 times. Yes, 20 times! But the numbers should be even more, due to the many websites that are still undetected.

Let's face it. Ever since that shocking incident, people are now starting to pay more attention to the devastation that is hitting people all over the globe. Be it terrorist attacks to natural disasters, it now seems to dominate the news. And this is a good thing. As many people are now more aware of the things going on, more help and donations seems to be reaching victims.

But where money goes, scammers will follow. And we do have to understand one thing. Charity is totally different from scamming people out of buying some products. With selling products, you need to convince people that those products are really worthwhile and worth the asking price. With charity however, there is no product involved. They don't need to convince people to part with their money.

All they do, is show lots of pictures of the devastation and victims to gather people's sympathy. After seeing all the horrible situation that those victims are going through, people are more inclined to donate. And it is very easy to create a website to fool people.

Think about it, they could just place images of the Red Cross in their website. Use the same loge, layout and colours to fool people. As for the address and telephone numbers, they will use the real Red Cross's number, so you could never find out. So, you look at the website and it looks real enough to you. You then call the number and you find out that it really belongs to the Red Cross.

But when you send in your donation, it will never reach the Red Cross, and thus, it never even helps those poor victims. It is extremely sad how some people are willing to take advantage of other people's sufforings, just so that they can make some extra income. The best advice I can give you to avoid those charity scams is either by donating straight to the source, or call the Red Cross's phone number or the relevant organization. Inform them of the website that you saw and ask if that website is associated with them.

That is one of the best ways of making sure. All of the local and international authorities consider this as a very serious criminal act. Please report any website that you find to be scams to the appropriate authorities. Together, we can make sure that those unconsiderable people are brought to the face of justice, and so that the real victims can receive the help that they so desparetly require. Due to the shocking increase in charity scams, we have to do our part to make sure that the numbers never rise again.

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