One of the most popular modes of payments today is Paypal. It’s been used by those who have merchant accounts, who are into home-based or freelancer work, or for families and friends who simply want to send money. With Paypal there’s hardly any money involved. Their system virtually accepts all kinds of credit card. But because it’s so uberpopular these days, it’s also been under scrutiny. Worse it’s been attacked by numerous Paypal scams.

A scam as it is, you’ll never know when you’re already hit until you get your latest credit card bill: exorbitant charges you aren’t aware of and not willing to pay and suspicious purchases from online websites you know you’ll never dare visit! So how will you ever be prepared of it when you practically don’t know how it goes, right?

Normally, online scammers aren’t really interested with your credit card per se. What they need is your basic information that will allow them to make electronic purchases courtesy of your card.

Warning 1. They will send you an e-mail, the sender disguising himself as a very important Paypal officer. The letter will appear like a very urgent request to confirm confidential information such as your name, your credit card, and your credit card number. The problem is they don’t give you the details. You’ll be the one to fill whatever form they attached or you need to send them a reply.

Warning 2. Haven’t you ever wondered why you’re receiving a Paypal e-mail in your Hotmail when you registered and confirmed with your Yahoo? But then, as long as you receive an e-mail in your inbox, who cares what’s in the To address, right? With Paypal scams, however, the To address is far different from what the company has in their file.

Warning 3. Scammers are smart. It’s either they can really penetrate into the system or they create fake headers. The latter is the usual case with Paypal scams. Fortunately, recent updates in e-mail platforms make them capable of recognizing fake headers and place them in Spam folders. So just click Delete and they’ll be gone forever in your mailbox—for now.

Warning 4. Companies such as Paypal know how to add great importance to their clients. So they send out personalized e-mails, not general ones. But since scammers basically don’t know who you are, they send out generic salutations like “Dear Paypal Member” or “Paypal User.”

Warning 5. As they say, if they can’t manage to get information as sweet as possible, then the next option is to coerce. Scam e-mails sound so threatening that your immediate thought is that it may actually be true. You’ll either have a deleted or suspended account real soon if you can’t give them the information they need. Paypal doesn’t do that. In any case, announcements are available in their website so check it out as often as possible.

Warning 6. There’s no security system in a sham e-mail. When you click any of the links, it isn’t a secured page, which is usually designated with “https” or a small padlock at the left corner of the bottom of the browser.