March Madness Is All Fun and Games Until Someone Gets Scammed
March Madness, otherwise known as the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament, is underway and the Better Business Bureau says people should be on the lookout for potential scams. A lot of people enjoy filling out their own brackets online, but Bureau Spokesman Dan Buchta says some of those sites can be dangerous.
“Some of those brackets are just click bait for getting you to a place where they can install malware and viruses on to your computer,” Buchta. “So if you are uploading information on to a bracket online and you start seeing pop ups on your screen, just close out of it and don’t go back to that site. You don’t want the viruses that it is going to download on to your computer.”
According to Buchta, people who plan on traveling to watch some of the games in person should be on high alert as well.
“People will buy travel packages to the tournament and they assume just because they bought a travel package that tickets to the game was included, but really all that was included was the airfare, the hotel, maybe a night of dining,” said Buchta. “If it doesn’t say tickets to the game are included they probably aren’t, double check before you book anything.”
Buchta says the bureau also receives multiple reports this time of year from people who got scammed with fake tickets. If you are planning on attending any of the tournament games, Buchta recommends using the official NCAA website to buy tickets.