Berbax.com is a scam website that offers to purchase items at extremely low prices. It may look like a discounter or a reseller of goods from stock liquidation, but it is actually just a ploy to make you think about this site as a legitimate one. Upon ordering goods from this site, you will most likely get nothing at all, or, at best, inferior or counterfeit items.
In this article, I will show the concerning indicators regarding the Berbax.com store, the way this scam operates, and teach how to detect similar scams. This will help you to avoid similar shopping scams in future.
Berbax.com Site – Scam Overview
As I said, Berbax.com may initially seem like a legit discounter or the merchant of stock liquidation items. But a brief analysis shows a disturbing amount of red flags that indicate clearly about this site’s dishonesty. Unfair advertising methods, unreasonably low prices, lack of customer support and user testimonials – this site accomplishes the scam bingo right away.
| Website | Berbax.com |
| Hosting | AS13335 Cloudflare, Inc. Canada, Ottawa |
| IP Address | 23.227.38.72 |
| Threat Type | Scam/Fraud |
| Scam Type | Fraudulent/Scam online shop |
Berbax.com Scam
By purchasing items on sites like Berbax.com, it is unlikely that you will receive the goods you’ve ordered. More frequently, it results in one of 3 instances typical for scam sites.
Counterfeit goods. Not the worst option, as you get at least something. But as it usually happens to fake items of popular brands, the quality will be inferior, to say the least. Eventually, the site may indicate about that somewhere deep in the item description or “about us” page, but users rarely check them thoroughly. This is a notably frequent case when ordering from pages that offer baubles, small electronics and stuff the like.
Wrong item. To make the purchase look real, but spend even less money on the actual item, scammers may ship a random item they have instead of your order. A worn t-shirt instead of a new one, a scratched aluminum plate instead of a set of dishes – frauds may turn quite inventive in that case.
Nothing at all. This is the most usual outcome when ordering from sites like Berbax.com. Fraudsters take your money, promise the delivery, and then merely disappear. As scam sites are not going to exist for a long time, fraudsters do not bother themselves with creating even a faint sight of legitimacy.
Berbax.com scam – How does it work?
As any fraud, Berbax.com runs a simple and well-proven modus operandi. It commonly consists of 3 stages, with some slight deviations from time to time.
Step 1 – Attract the Masses. Frauds post huge amounts of marketing on social media, particularly preferring Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and TikTok. Paid ads say exactly the same things as the websites do: 90% discounts, free delivery around the world, hurry up to get the deal.
Ads of fraudulent shops posted on different platforms
As users regard ads on the mentioned platforms benign, they do not suspect anything at this point. Ads become particularly compelling during major events that boost people’s interest in shopping, like Halloween, Black Friday, Christmas, etc. Sometimes, they mask themselves as resellers of the liquidated stock of bankrupt retail companies.
Step 2 – Take the Money. Once consumers are on the site, swindlers do their best to make the users buy something. Mind-boggling deals, additional discounts, free delivery, bright and blinking “Order Now” buttons that are just everywhere – they use every single method possible. And this works out – uninformed consumers stick to the offers and proceed to paying for the order.
Payments are done in a strange manner. Instead of more classic options for online shopping, like Visa/MasterCard payments or PayPal, tricksters offer using direct bank transfers, Venmo or CashApp. Thing is, the latter do not provide any refunds, regardless of the circumstances. Even when you can prove that the transaction went to swindlers, “no refunds” is a part of their policy which you agree on upon registration.
Step 3 – Vanish. Once rascals get enough money, or – what is more likely – there are enough grievances and user feedback about the site being fraudulent, they just vanish. Usually, this happens at around the 2nd or 3rd week of the site activity. Once enough individuals know about the dishonest activity, the profits will dry up, leaving crooks with no motivation to move on. Reporting the scam to the domain hosting speeds up the domain takedown.
Why is Berbax.com a Scam?
Well, we just talked about the way the scam site operates. Now, let’s see how to understand whether the site is deceptive without risking your money. Fortunately, frauds do not bother themselves with creating well-rounded disguises, so the same red flags repeat from one site to another.
1. Fake or absent reviews
Fraud sites aim to exist for 1-2 weeks, so there’s no reason (and way) to make any online reputation with user reviews. Obviously, even legit online shopping sites will lack buyer opinions when they have just started, since there were only a few buyers yet. For that reason, this sign is not stand-alone and requires confirmation by other signs or indicators.
Definitely not generic comments generated by AI
However, once you face unrealistic reviews that have nothing to do with what the site sells, that’s definitely not a good sign. Any blurred or nonsense reviews that may describe any item sold on the website should be taken with a grain of salt. And well, on dishonest websites you will get an entire saltcellar. Do not hesitate searching for reviews on Google – this may save your money.
2. Unbelievably high discounts/low prices
No merchants will sell goods at loss for themselves. 70%, 80%, 90% reductions are not viable even during sales events such as the aforementioned Christmas. In some cases, fraudulent sites set the prices low without saying anything about discounts, but they will most likely be ludicrous, like $30 for a bed or $10 for a branded leather bag. Goods may be sold at a low price, but every discount has its rational limits.
3. No customer support.
This is what distinguishes scam sites from the legit ones, even newly established. When a site is about to rip off the buyers, there’s no need to bother about answering their questions. Check out the “About us” or “Info” page – the site will have no support contacts at all.
Typically for fraudulent sites, the “About us” column is completely empty
When they offer an email, or even a phone to reach them out, there is a huge possibility that these contacts will be unresponsive to your request. This, or you will receive some generic text regardless of your question.
As scoundrels tend to reuse phone numbers and email addresses for specifying them as “support”, you can search them on Google. When they are mentioned on a different site, be sure that this is a blatant scam.
A chain of scam websites that use the same “support email”
4. Payments via payment systems that does not support refunds
This scam indicator is complementary, as there are a whole lot of legit services using direct bank transfers, CashApp, Venmo or similar payment systems. All of them though have the same feature I’ve already mentioned above: they do not suppose any refunds. And this is what attracts scammers – once you paid for the order, nothing will help you to get the money back.
Some websites may also offer payments in crypto, which is even less controllable than aforementioned payment methods. While crypto payments expand their presence slowly, they still remain a beloved bay for different scammers.
5. Items’ images are sourced from another page
As frauds are unlikely to have any goods on hand, they cannot make unique pics. Thus their only option is simply to hijack these images from other sites. When scammers market identical items on different websites, you can find such images on similarly-looking fraudulent pages. By searching for the image on Google, you can prove the uniqueness of an image.
Image duplicates on another scam site, as well as on Amazon and Walmart sites
6. Design repeats the one of a different page
This is the continuation of the stolen images I’ve just described. As scammers may use the same topic repeatedly, they use the same web design under the new web-address, and voila – a new scam is ready to rock-n-roll! In some cases, reverse image search advice from the previous paragraph may lead you to the identical copy of the original site. It makes uncovering such scams pretty easy, but scoundrels who create them never aim at cautious users.
Example of scam sites that duplicate each others’ design
Is your PC infected?
There are cases when Berbax.com site, together with similar scam pages, are promoted by malware. Adware and browser hijackers are two particular malware types known for such behavior. If you see excessive ads in your browser, see your search queries redirected in a different search engine and some random pages open time to time, consider scanning your system with GridinSoft Anti-Malware. This will help you to get rid of annoying promotions and scam sites.
Remove malware with Gridinsoft Anti-Malware
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Frequently Asked Questions about the Berbax.com Scam
Berbax.com operates as a scam website that pretends to be an online store selling various items at low prices. However, it is involved in fraudulent activities and aims to deceive customers by sending counterfeit or inferior products or not delivering anything at all.
There are a couple of warning signs to watch out for. To begin with, Berbax.com shop recently set up its webpage, which is a typical trait of brief deceptive sites that rapidly vanish. Secondly, the webpage lacks contact information such as a telephone number, street address, or instant messaging choice, making it hard to resolve matters or questions. Third, it shows fake company details, offering no genuine information about the enterprise behind the website. Moreover, this scam entices shoppers with unrealistic price cuts and sales offers, slashing prices by over 70% or even 90%. Additionally, Berbax.com copies text and item pictures from genuine e-commerce platforms like Alibaba, Amazon, and Aliexpress, showing a shortage of unique ideas and credibility. Furthermore, despite stating to offer trendy and fashionable goods, the webpage lacks any online networking presence or links to online networking platforms. Lastly, genuine customer feedback is completely absent, with reports of delayed or absent deliveries, inferior client assistance, faulty or inaccurate products, refund difficulties, and unapproved billing on credit cards.
No, it is not a legitimate or reliable website. The aforementioned red flags indicate that it lacks credibility and has been reported as a scam site. Customers have experienced receiving counterfeit products or facing difficulties in obtaining refunds or contacting the company.
Take the following steps if you have made a purchase on Berbax.com:
- Firstly, immediately contact your bank or financial institution if you paid with a credit card or debit card. Request them to cancel the transaction and initiate a refund. Additionally, report Berbax.com as a fraudulent site and urge them to block future charges from it.
- Promptly change your passwords if you have a Berbax.com account or use the same password for other online accounts. Consider enabling two-factor authentication to enhance security against hackers attempting to access your accounts and steal personal information.
- Beware of phishing emails related to your Berbax.com order. Treat any emails offering discounts or refunds as phishing attempts. Avoid clicking on suspicious links or downloading attachments that may contain malware. Delete such emails immediately.
- To prevent malicious ads, Trojans, phishing attempts, and other undesirable content, use a browser-based content blocker like AdGuard. This will complement your antivirus software and provide enhanced protection.
- If you suspect your device is infected with malware, scan it using Gridinsoft Anti-Malware to ensure your security.
No, Berbax.com does not have genuine customer feedback or testimonials. The absence of legitimate customer reviews further indicates its untrustworthiness and potentially fraudulent nature.
