Exploration into the world of cyber-crime will undoubtedly take you to some pretty shady places. It will also take you to some websites that seem legitimate, but provide bad actors the ability to take something from you. Whether that be banking account information, passwords, or more personal data, fake websites are a path used.

I have experienced this first-hand when looking for the right dog for my family. The leading indicators were small and hard to spot, but obvious if you’re looking. First, the website claimed to be from Western Washington and had pictures of all of the puppies they had for sale, but all of the pictures on the website seemed to be taken in a different area of the United States. Upon further investigation, I was able to find most of these pictures on other websites.

The second thing I noticed (because I had looked at many websites for this purpose) was that the descriptions on the page were identical to other pages I had seen. I started copying the homepage of every website into my Google search bar to see how many websites shared the same narrative. By the end of this, I realized that there aren’t many legitimate websites to find dogs.

The last thing I noticed, once I realized this was a site built to scam, was the level at which the website’s code was written. Most small businesses normally use websites like GoDaddy or WordPress, and when I looked at this website’s code it seemed handwritten. Not to say that people aren’t allowed to design their own websites, it is just out of the norm.

Other examples of fake websites are those mimicking legitimate businesses, like FedEx or Facebook, to get you to give them information like address, credit card information, or passwords. These websites will look like the actual website with small differences or spelling errors. The links to them often come via a text message or phishing email. I often receive text messages from the “United States Postal Service” claiming to have a package waiting for me and to click the link to schedule re-delivery.