Facebook Scam Runs Rampant in Otsego County, New York

Facebook and social media scams are a normal part of our daily lives these days, but there's one that's everywhere that I wanted to warn our readers not to fall for. Read on and protect yourself.

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Air Duct Cleaning Scam

It seems that fake or hacked profiles are coming into local groups and advertising air duct cleaning services for their homes and businesses. These posts are like post apocalyptic roaches. They're everywhere and pop up over and over in that corner that you thought you cleaned and treated.

They usually go something like this:

I posted about Air Duct Cleaning Service We need just 2-3 more jobs to full fil my truck we are doing Complete house Air Duct Cleaning service in flat price our first priority is all my customers fully happy and satisfied to our work

Just scratching the surface, there are a few red flags to look for. The first is the absolutely atrocious butchering of the English language. Full fil my truck? Really? The misuse of capital letters is making my eye twitch. The post goes on to offer some whopping discount on this service. More often than not, there's a comment, in all caps that says ANYONE INTERESTED PLEASE PM ME FOR MORE DETAILS.

Whatever you do, once you PM, you will be asked for personal information, and probably financial information. This is when you will more than likely be scammed and robbed.

There's usually a series of pictures looking like this, trying to scare you into reaching out.

Tips from the pros

The National Air Duct Cleaners Association has provided the following tips about these scam posts:

1. The post says “Believe my work, not my words. This is not a scam.” Hint: if they have to say it’s not a scam, it’s certainly a scam.
2. No company name is included in the post. Legitimate businesses will always use their name since they want to showcase their services to the public.
3. Scammers provide a company name via a personal message such as “Duct Cleaning Colorado” or “Duct Cleaners.” Those company names are generic and impossible to find on Google since it’s not a legitimate business.
4. They occasionally provide a phone number, but it’s probably fake.
5. The Facebook account is just a few days/weeks old. In most cases, their names don’t match the user names in the URL. Hint: This is one of the easiest red flags to spot when it comes to a scam.
6. The Facebook profile is locked down tighter than Fort Knox. No followers, posts, or photos can be seen.
7. Their occupation says they work at Facebook Marketplace.
8. The scammer uses words like “kindly.” Example: Kindly message me to have our service.