Black Friday Sale Scam 2025: Tips on how to safeguard yourself from fake shopping scams

In the prelude to Thanksgiving and Christmas, Black Friday and Cyber Monday festive sale campaigns are predominantly popular in the West. However, e-commerce companies have managed to spread the hype in the East as well.

Thanks to mouth-watering discounts in the offing, consumers in millions are drawn to online shopping portals. However, if they are cautious enough, they may end up paying dearly.

Every year, threat actors just before the festive season kicks in, set up fake websites with fonts and typefaces matching popular retail firms such as Amazon, Flipkart, Walmart, AliExpress and even technology companies.

They put malware-laced online forms on the website for naive users to fill out during checkout, one step before making the purchase. The latter unwittingly shares their bank card information, phone numbers, email IDs and more. These critical personal financial data are misused to clean the bank accounts of the victims.

Fake websites created by cyber criminals.

"October saw 158 new Black Friday-related domains, a staggering 93 per cent increase over the 2025 monthly average. Early November intensified that growth, with more than 330 new related domains appearing in only the first 10 days," says the Check Point Research report.

It also added that 1 in 11 newly registered Black Friday-themed domains are classified as harmful. As noted earlier, brand impersonation remains a primary tactic, with 1 in 25 new reputable ecommerce marketplaces of Amazon, AliExpress, and Alibaba-related domains flagged as malicious.

While brands have the responsibility to have a dedicated cybersecurity team to track such fake websites, customers should also exercise caution while shopping online.

Here are some tips on how to safeguard yourself from such fake Black Friday sale scams:

1) No matter how lucrative the discount offers, always ignore and delete emails from unknown senders

2) Even if the email is from a person with a familiar name or a popular company known to you, read it carefully. Cyber crooks use lucrative offers as bait, such as cash prizes and tell you to click on a URL link or a PDF to get more information. Do not press any link or download any file.

3) Never share online account details such as Gmail IDs, bank customer IDs and passwords on messenger apps or on emails with anybody

4) Never install apps from third-party app stores or links marketed on social media platforms. Always download apps from Google Play or Apple App Store, or Microsoft Windows Store

5) It is a good practice to install an anti-virus application from a well-known publisher on your device. Once installed, ensure to turn on the safe browsing feature

6) Always update your device to the latest version to protect yourself from new emerging cyber threats

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