Jewelery show scammers get back to business

The scams – which were increasingly prevalent before COVID forced the closure of most international trade shows around the world – are very simple.

These scams tend to target three things: attendee lists, fair directories, and hotel reservations.

Participant lists

This is the most common scam and involves exhibitors being contacted by people claiming to have a list of attendees for an upcoming show. For a price, you buy every visitor’s full contact details – even before they attend the event!

Scammers will often use the salon name, logo, and/or salon organizer name in the email signature.

Jeweler is aware of a number of emails currently circulating stating: “We offer you the contact list of participants of the IJF International Jewelery Fair 2022: are you interested in buying?”

The email then lists categories of attendees, including jewelry retailers, department store shoppers, watch or clock retailers, duty-free retailers, jewelry manufacturers, and more.

Exhibition directories

This scam involves exhibitors receiving an email to update their company information in the “Directory of International Fairs”, or another name similar to the name of the exhibition they are to attend.

These emails appear at a time when vendors are focusing on show planning.

A few years ago, a number of Australian jewelery suppliers were caught up in this scam when they found themselves agreeing to pay a company €1,212 (AU1,796) every year for three years for the “privilege advertisement in a directory, which had no connection with a trade show.

Hotel reservations

This scam has not been as prominent in the Australian jewelery industry; however, again, it’s very simple: exhibitors are presented with “too good to refuse” hotel deals only to find they have booked rooms through a third-party room broker .

People arrive at the hotel to find that no reservations exist and there is no recourse for payment for the rooms. These “brokers” falsely imply that they are affiliated with show management and fraudulently secure deposits and/or full prepayment.

Gary Fitz-Roy, managing director of Expertise Events, said not only does he get calls every year from jewelry exhibitors about selling the attendee list, but he also said his own company gets offers to buy the list of participants of your own show!

“It’s an old scam and nobody running it is very sophisticated. The scammers copy our website’s exhibitor list contact details, along with our contact details as the show organizer, and then try to sell us a list of attendees they don’t have.

“In fact, a few years ago when we started a new show in another industry, scammers were trying to sell the attendee list from a show that never happened. It was the first event,” Fitz-Roy said.

He advises exhibitors to ignore these emails: “Suppliers and exhibitors and especially visitors [retail buyers] must be assured that Expertise Events does not sell our database, scammers have no access to it.

“It’s just a fraud, just another internet scam.”

Investigation

This publication receives many emails attempting to scam the list of participants, and a quick search for the email address and/or adding the URL of the so-called list broker will quickly expose the scam. That is, although the email address could be, for example, [email protected], there will be no commercial exhibitor website.

Jeweler decided to engage with one of the scammers offering the list of attendees at the International Jewelery Show. We asked for the details of this listing and the cost.

We were supposed to contact Henry Johnston, a database and list expert from an international search firm based in Pennsylvania, USA. Even though our email replies were sent during Australian business hours, they were answered promptly when it was supposed to be 3am in the US.

We had Johnston call our office to discuss the details. We were told the attendee list for a show that did not take place included the names, addresses, phone numbers and email addresses of 15,237 jewelery buyers who were due to attend the Sydney show.

When asked about the number of buyers, the man – who revealed he was an Indian national – confirmed the figure was correct. He also confirmed he was located in Pennsylvania, the address on the company’s website, and explained that “he’s on call to answer questions, even at 3 a.m.!”

At this point, we asked him if he could tell us how many jewelery stores there are in Australia according to his “extensive database of jewelery buyers”.

He said he could provide that number, but first he had to ‘query the database’, at which point there was a rapid and seemingly exaggerated typing (knock) on a keyboard to signify search queries .

The answer came back “over 40,000”.

Jeweler confirmed the question to Johnston and he replied, “Yes, that’s right, there are over 40,000 independent jewelery shops in Australia. And we have all their contact details.

For the record, the total number of jewelery stores in Australia, including chain stores such as Michael Hill, Prouds, etc., is less than 3,000!

After further discussion – including a host of more outrageous claims – we agreed to purchase the listing.

We were presented with a $500 bill showing payment details for a National Australia Bank account; Nevertheless; payment was to be made through a specific Western Union office in Sunshine, a western suburb of Melbourne.

Needless to say, the payment was never made, although we assured Mr. Johnston that it had been.

Fitz-Roy said the only way to deal with scammers is to not respond. “This is happening at all of our shows and other event organizers around the world.

“Expertise Events has by far the largest database of jewelry retailers and buyers. We would never sell, rent or give away our listings.