Minotola.com is a deceptive website that offers to purchase clothes at extremely low prices. This site may look like a discounter or a reseller of goods from stock liquidation, but it is in fact just a narrative to make you think this site is legitimate. After placing an order on this site, you will likely get nothing at all, or, at best, inferior or counterfeit items.
In this article, I will demonstrate the red flags regarding the Minotola.com site, the way this scam operates, and teach how to detect similar scams. This will help you to avoid similar shopping frauds in future.
Minotola.com Site – Scam Overview
As I said, Minotola.com may initially seem like a authentic discounter or the merchant of stock liquidation items. But a short analysis shows a disturbing amount of red flags that say clearly about this site’s dishonesty. Unfair advertising methods, excessively low prices, lack of customer support and user reviews – this site fulfills the fraud bingo right away.
| Website | Minotola.com |
| Hosting | AS13335 Cloudflare, Inc. United States, San Francisco |
| IP Address | 188.114.97.3 |
| Threat Type | Scam/Fraud |
| Scam Type | Fraudulent/Scam online shop |
Minotola.com Scam
By purchasing on pages like Minotola.com, it is improbable that you will obtain the items you’ve ordered. More typically, it results in one of 3 situations common for scam sites.
Counterfeit goods. Not the worst option, as you get at least something. But as it usually happens to counterfeit items of popular brands, the standard 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 particularly often case when ordering from pages that market baubles, small electronics and stuff the like.
Wrong item. To make the deal look legit, but spend even less money on the actual item, rascals may send a accidental item they have instead of what you’ve ordered. A worn t-shirt instead of a branded one, a dented aluminum plate instead of a set of dishes – frauds may turn really inventive in that case.
Nothing at all. This is the most typical situation when ordering items from websites like Minotola.com. Fraudsters take your money, promise the delivery, and then simply vanish. As scam sites are not going to exist for a long time, scams are not wasting time creating even a remote sight of legitimacy.
Minotola.com scam – How does it work?
As any fraud, Minotola.com follows a simple and well-proven scheme of operations. It commonly consists of 3 stages, with certain deviations from time to time.
Step 1 – Attract the Masses. Frauds post huge amounts of marketing on online platforms, 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 especially 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 customers are on the website, fraudsters do their best to make the users buy something. Mind-boggling deals, additional discounts, free shipping, bright and blinking “Order Now” buttons that are just everywhere – they use every single method possible. And this works out – uninformed users 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, fraudsters 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 fraudsters, “no refunds” is a part of their policy which you agree on upon registration.
Step 3 – Vanish. Once crooks get enough money, or – what is more likely – there are enough complaints and user reports regarding the site being a scam, they just disappear. Usually, this happens at around the 2nd or 3rd week of the site activity. Once enough customers are aware 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 Minotola.com a Scam?
Well, we just talked about the way the hoax site operates. Now, let’s see how to understand whether the site is untrustworthy 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
Scam websites aim to exist for 1-2 weeks, so there’s no purpose (and way) to make any reputation with user reviews. Obviously, even benign online shopping sites will lack buyer opinions shortly after the start, as there were not many patrons 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 offers for sale, that’s definitely not a good sign. Any blurred or drivel reviews that may describe any item sold on the site should be taken with a grain of salt. And well, on scam sites you will get an entire saltcellar. Always search 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% markdowns are not trustworthy even during sales events such as the aforementioned Black Friday. In some cases, fraudulent websites have the initial price low without saying anything about discounts, but they will most likely be absurd, like $30 for a bed or $10 for a branded leather bag. Goods may be sold for cheap, but every sell-off has its reasonable limits.
3. No customer support.
This is what distinguishes dishonest websites from the genuine ones, even newly established. When a site is about to defraud the customers, there’s no need to waste time on answering their questions. Check out the “About us” or “Info” page (if it is present at all) – the site will have no support contacts at all.
Typically for fraudulent sites, the “About us” column is completely empty
When they offer a contact email, or even a phone number to reach them out, there is a huge possibility that these numbers and emails will be unresponsive to your request. This, or they will answer you with generic text regardless of your inquiry.
As frauds tend to reuse numbers and emails for specifying them as “support”, you can search them on Google. When they are mentioned on a totally different site, be sure you’re facing a blatant scam.
A chain of scam sites 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 shops using direct bank transfers, CashApp, Venmo or similar payment systems. Each of the latter has the same pitfall I’ve already mentioned above: they do not suppose any refunds. And this is what attracts scammers – once you paid for the order, there’s no way to get the money back.
Some sites may also ask for payments in crypto, which is even less controllable than aforementioned payment methods. While cryptocurrency transactions expand their presence slowly, they still remain a beloved bay for different rascals.
5. Items’ images are sourced from another page
As scams are unlikely to have any goods on hand, they cannot make unique pics. Thus their only option is to hijack these images elsewhere. When frauds offer identical items on different pages, you can find same pics on similarly-looking fraudulent pages. By reverse image searching 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
Rascals do not stop on stealing photos. As frauds may scam people on the same topic repeatedly, they use the same site design under the new web-address, and voila – a new scam site is ready to rock-n-roll! In some cases, reverse image search on Google advice I’ve mentioned above may lead you to the identical copy of the original site. It makes uncovering such scams particularly easy, but criminals who create them never aim at cautious users.
Example of scam sites that duplicate each others’ design
Is your PC infected?
There are situations when Minotola.com website, along with similar scam pages, are promoted by malware. Adware and browser hijackers are two particular malware types that aim specifically at such purposes. If you see excessive ads in your web browser, see your search inquiries redirected into an unusual search engine and some random pages open time to time, scan 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 Minotola.com Scam
Minotola.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 red flags to watch out for. To begin with, Minotola.com shop recently created its website, which is a common trait of short-lived fraud sites that rapidly disappear. Second, the site lacks contact information such as a phone number, street address, or instant messaging alternative, making it hard to resolve matters or inquiries. Third, it provides counterfeit business information, presenting no real data about the enterprise behind the webpage. Furthermore, this deceptive tactic entices buyers with impractical rebates and promotions, reducing prices by over 70% or even 90%. Additionally, Minotola.com plagiarizes text and merchandise visuals from legitimate e-commerce platforms like Alibaba, Amazon, and Aliexpress, demonstrating a lack of innovation and credibility. Moreover, despite asserting to provide trendy and fashionable goods, the site lacks any online networking presence or links to social media platforms. Lastly, authentic client testimonials is completely absent, with reports of delayed or missing deliveries, substandard customer service, faulty or incorrect products, reimbursement 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 Minotola.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 Minotola.com as a fraudulent site and urge them to block future charges from it.
- Promptly change your passwords if you have a Minotola.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 Minotola.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, Minotola.com does not have genuine customer feedback or testimonials. The absence of legitimate customer reviews further indicates its untrustworthiness and potentially fraudulent nature.
