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According to the newest Data Spotlight, 40,000 people reported losing a whopping $148 million in gift cards to scammers during the first nine months of 2021. Those are staggering numbers which have increased each year for the past several years. Since 2018, gift cards have been the most frequently reported payment method for fraud. But which gift card brand do scammers ask people to buy, and lose the most money on? Google Play, Apple, eBay, and Walmart cards remain popular with scammers. But this year, Target gift cards are scammers’ top choice.

Most gift card scams start with a phone call from someone impersonating a branch of the government like the Social Security Administration, or a business. The caller might threaten to freeze your bank account and tell you that you must buy gift cards to avoid arrest or to keep access to your money in your bank account. They will tell you to stay on the phone as you head to the store to buy gift cards to, they often claim, solve the “problem” they are calling about. They will also ask you to provide the numbers on the back of the card you buy. These are all signs of a gift card scam.

If you find yourself heading to the store to buy gift cards because someone on the phone told you so, stop. No matter who calls, texts, or emails you telling you to pay with a gift card, it is always a scammer. The government and legitimate businesses will never call you demanding payment with a gift card.

As we head into the holidays, remember: Gift cards are for gifts, not for payments. Report gift card scams to the gift card issuer, and the FTC at ReportFraud.ftc.gov. Visit ftc.gov/giftcards for more information and check out this quick video.

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The purpose of this blog and its comments section is to inform readers about Federal Trade Commission activity, and share information to help them avoid, report, and recover from fraud, scams, and bad business practices. Your thoughts, ideas, and concerns are welcome, and we encourage comments. But keep in mind, this is a moderated blog. We review all comments before they are posted, and we won’t post comments that don’t comply with our commenting policy. We expect commenters to treat each other and the blog writers with respect.

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Revealer
December 08, 2021
How about the gangstalkers being paid in Walmart gift cards?
Caroline
December 09, 2021
Many older people aren't online so the FTC could make a world of difference if they mailed older people about these scams. I know my mother is not online no does she go to a library where this information might be available, so she would have no way of knowing that legitimate businesses don't ask for gift cards.
rockpup
December 09, 2021
yes that did happen to me but i did not applied to it when they call i just hang up on them.
CJ85719
December 14, 2021
I recently came in contact on Facebook with a scammer pretending to be a famous celebrity. This scammer sent a message to me writing "please inbox me" which was a term I had to look up to find out what it meant. So I did send a messenger message to this Facebook user and from there we had conversation where he pretended to be a celebrity. I was skeptical from the beginning but played along to see where it would go. Soon he asked if I would be willing to send a gift card for "the underprivilege" and made several spelling and grammar errors, even misspelled my first name. Then asked me to send the numbers from the back of the gift card to an e-mail account to "annwilson5450@ ". I told him that the whole thing was weird and sent him a FTC link outlining this gift card scam. He never responded after that. Reported his fake account to Facebook and have not heard back from Facebook. If Facebook stopped scammers impersonating celebrities sooner, these guys wouldn't be in business.