Saudi Commerce Ministry warns shoppers against online scams

Saudi Commerce Ministry warns shoppers against online scams

JEDDAH: Saudi Arabia has recently become the target of online fraudsters and scammers whose fake logos impersonate government entities in an attempt to lure not only naive online shoppers but experienced ones.

The Saudi Ministry of Commerce renewed its warning to consumers against shopping with unknown and unreliable foreign electronic stores. It said that monitoring and follow-up operations had led to group of websites belonging to a Chinese store, which was blocked earlier, in addition to 184 links to sites with different names.

The ministry confirmed that it is continuing its efforts to track and block these links to protect consumers in coordination with the competent authorities.

It added that these websites were exploiting social media platforms to target the Saudi market with fake and misleading ads and low-quality goods.

In its statement, the ministry said that the violating websites had a number of things in common: "They use random website addresses; they lack information about the facility, its address, and contact numbers; they communicate with shoppers only via emails; they intensify their online ads through social media and video-sharing social networking service platforms such as Twitter, Snapchat and TikTok.“

The blocked sites, the statement added, use the Arabic language and Saudi currency in their dealings