6 Shopify Scams to Be Wary Of

Is Shopify legit? Definitely, for the most part. Still, there are a few common scams everyone should be aware of. 

Ecommerce platforms made it possible for small businesses to have a wider market and reach customers beyond their location and borders through their online stores.

But there are two sides to every coin. The bad news is that store owners and shoppers can’t always escape fraudsters on these platforms.

Is Shopify legit? The answer is: absolutely. As one of the biggest ecommerce platforms Shopify has a lot of security measures in place. Here are some of them.

• SSL certificate: The SSL certificate is an industry standard that protects personal information of people shopping from your Shopify store. 
• PCI compliant: PCI compliance refers to adherence to the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS), a set of security standards designed to ensure that all companies that accept, process, store, or transmit credit card information maintain a secure environment.
• Shopify Payments: Shopify Payments is Shopify’s built-in payment processing solution that allows merchants to accept payments directly through their online stores without needing to integrate with a third-party payment gateway like PayPal or Stripe. This ensures all the payment details are stored on the Shopify platform, which helps with with resolving disputes 
• Customer service: Shopify provides round-the-clock customer support through various channels, including live chat, email, and phone. This support ensures that users can resolve any issues quickly.‍
• Community: Shopify has a large and active community of users, developers, and partners who contribute to the platform’s continuous improvement and offer support and resources to new users.

And yet, even with all these measures in place, Shopify still isn’t immune to fraudulent ac Here are 6 common Shopify scams to be aware of.

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Triangulation scheme

One of the smartest and most enduring schemes on Shopify and other ecommerce platforms is the so-called triangulation scheme. 

Basically, fraudsters create a Shopify Store and market themselves as selling proper products. They then buy products from online suppliers, acting as the middleman in shipping the merchandise to the shoppers’ addresses (which is exactly how dropshipping works). 

But, here’s the catch: they buy the merchandise from the suppliers with stolen credit card information. The credit card company will reject the transaction and initiate a chargeback on Shopify. When a chargeback occurs, Shopify doesn’t return the money to the seller, hence they lose both the product and the money.

The triangulation scheme was especially on the rise in 2016 when the Pokemon Go game came out. Lots of fake stores claimed to sell this game and managed to scam a lot of people.

Shopify Store duplicator scheme

The duplicator scheme is so simple, yet it’s hard to believe people can pull it off. 

Basically, scammers find a recently created legitimate store on Shopify and create one with a similar domain name, claiming to sell the same original product. All sorts of products have been “mirrored” on similar web addresses, from original merchandise t-shirts to branded teabags.

The most famous example of this scheme is when scammers created a duplicate store to Mike Lindell’s MyPillow store with a domain name mypillow.com. In 2018, the merchant noticed a twin storefront to his, registered under the domain name mypillowstore.com. Lindell sued Shopify for failing to spot the scamming sites and bigcommerce trademark infringement. 

In the meantime, Shopify took down the fake storefront and added more software tools that cost $30 and up and offer monthly maintenance for merchants’ transactions. They also have more tech teams dedicated to combing out the fake Shopify sites.

Switching scheme

This is one of the more serious schemes since it causes a long-term loss with sellers. It has been prevalent in e-commerce platforms such as eBay before. Basically, what happens is that a potential buyer will make a purchase on your Shopify store and request a direct invoice from you straight from PayPal. As a reason for this, they will say they have difficulty and can’t finish a payment because of technical issues on the Shopify platform.

After you send them an invoice, you will get a notification that is allegedly from PayPal, but actually fake, that the buyer has paid and is waiting for the product tracking number. Until you give them the tracking number, “PayPal” checkout has the funds on hold. Naturally, if a seller falls for the trick, the scammer will get the products for free, since there is no PayPal holding the funds. If we’re talking about a big shipment or a very expensive product, as a seller, you could lose a lot of money.

Direct Client scheme

This scam takes some sweet-talking scammers. Basically, a buyer makes a purchase that goes well, and the products are at the right shipping address on time. Then, when the seller gains the buyer’s trust, they make a suggestion that next time they should skip the whole hassle and extra costs on Shopify, and go straight to a direct card payment technique. Of course, then they have the credit card digits and data, so they can exhaust the buyer’s fund. The buyer, needless to say, doesn’t get the goods this time.

Fake return ticket

This is another simple, but effective Shopify scam.

Basically a person will pose as an unhappy client and ask for a refund. They will send a fake tracking number for the return package, or they might send an empty box. So, the seller could end up losing both the money and the product.

Fake Purchase order

This is the scam that requires the most technical knowledge and software skills to be performed. So it’s rarer but extremely effective, and you’d still need to be wary.  Basically, a scammer that is in the position of a customer will create a copy of the seller’s Shopify checkout sheet in their drive and alter the submit button link. Then, they will patch it to their  PHP software or program that enables saving all data saved from your checkout. Afterward, they will modify the data they received and adjust it to send the fake checkout sheet back, at a lower price. You won’t notice the difference in price without knowing it’s doctored, and approve the transaction.

This scam allows the fraudsters to get products without the seller's consent or with it but for a smaller price, and before the seller realizes that something is going on they can lose a whole shipment’s worth of money.

If they don’t successfully doctor the purchase sheet, they have a good plan B: asking for a chargeback, which will still make the seller lose money.

How to report scams

As a customer, you can report fraudulent activity or bad experience with a merchant here. The list covers many situations, from non-delivery of a sold item to restricted items and illegal activity.

 However, if you’re on the other side of the selling process and being scammed by a customer, apart from having a premium Shopify web store with all maintenance services, it’s mostly up to you to look out for the red flags and stay careful.

Choosing a secure payment gateway and having a single place for all your transactions with Shopify payments is helpful.

Also, it’s safe to save proof of your transactions, by making screenshots that you can later use to prove your case when reporting fraudulent transactions.

Lastly, it’s fair to mention that Shopify, no matter the many measures they take with battling scammers, is still swarming with fraudulent activity.