As an artist myself, I don’t want to be scammed. I have received many scammy messages and comments on social media that sound very attractive but luckily I didn’t fall for them. I think it would be helpful to share those five popular art scams today so hopefully, no artists fall into that trap.
An art scam can be understood as a scam that targets artists. With the fast development of technology, art scammers have more delicate ways to trick people, especially artists who are trying to sell their artwork and make a living out of it. The victims will eventually either lose money or their social accounts.
In the next sections, you will learn about the top 5 art scams, how they work, and tips to secure your accounts to avoid being scammed.
5 Art Scams Targeting Artists
Art Scam #1 - Buying Artwork as NFTs
NFTs (non-fungible tokens) refer to a digital property certificate. The buyers and sellers will do transactions to transfer the ownership of goods (physical or digital) on platforms where cryptocurrencies are used. Those platforms use blockchain technology to track transactions and certify the ownership of a user account over the property.
Because not many artists know about NFT, blockchain, and how they work, artists become one of the targets of scammers.
This is how the art scam works:
- A Facebook or Instagram profile leaves a comment on your posts that you shared your artwork. They will compliment your art and say that they want to purchase some of your masterpieces, they are ready to add them to their collections, or they will ask if the art is for sale to open a conversation with you.
- This person then asks you to send him/her a DM (direct message). He/she might send you a friend request to send you messages later on without being caught by the social platform algorithm.
- The scammer will say that he or she can only purchase your art as NFTs. To get the cryptocurrencies they use to pay for your artwork, you will be required to create an account on a platform or website and have to pay a fee with your real money for the supposed transaction.
- You are instructed to buy and then send cryptos to a digital wallet. As soon as that is done, they will transfer the cryptos to their real accounts and block you.
- You cannot get your money because the platform you worked on is fake.
Art Scam #2 - Ordering a Commissioned Artwork & Paying by PayPal
This is how the art scam using PayPal works:
- A person approaches you to ask if you do commissioned artwork. They want to have a portrait painting or drawing of a pet or a person because they want to have a gift for their loved ones.
- They’re willing to pay a high price for the piece but can only pay via PayPal. They can pay upfront right away.
- When you agree on the commission and give them your PayPal email, they’ll send you fake emails that look like emails from PayPal.
- You’ll be informed “by PayPal” in the fake emails that the payment has been put on hold because you have exceeded the limit on your account. Because your account is not verified as a Business account, the customer had to pay an extra fee to expand your limit.
- You’ll be asked “by fake PayPal” that you have to refund the extra amount to your customer to avoid legal issues. The scammer will send you non-stop messages to put more pressure on you.
- You might believe in that and “refund” the money from your bank account. As soon as it’s done, you’ll be blocked by the scammer and they just disappear.
Art Scam #3 - Buying an Artwork or Paying for Using It With a Fake Check
This is how the art scam using a check as a payment method works:
- The scammer will contact you over social media such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, etc., or via email, and say that they want to use their image for an art project or they want to buy one of your artworks.
- They are willing to offer a generous amount of money and want to pay by check.
- They will send you a (fake) check that will bounce in a week or two, sometimes longer. The bank will deposit money into your account right away when they receive a check. You may think that this is a real deal and trust the potential client.
- The scammer will “overpay” and when you ask them about that, they will ask you to forward some of the money to someone else such as a charity, or for shipping services. They’ll be getting your actual money from your bank account.
- When the check bounces, the bank will take all the money in your bank account back. Your account might be frozen or closed, and you will have to deal with the financial consequences.
Art Scam #4 - Vanity Galleries
This is how the art scam works:
- These vanity galleries can be physical or online gallery spaces.
- They will approach you via DMs on social media or email and offer the slots for displaying your artwork.
- You will be asked to pay a very complex list of “fees” to display your work, or you’re required to use their very expensive framing services to be displayed in their gallery.
- You may go for it and think that you are getting some exposure, and someone might buy your artwork. But in fact, you will get very limited exposure because the galleries don’t focus on promoting your art but on collecting money from you and other artists.
Kindly note that this type of scam is different from an open-called exhibition in an established gallery with invited well-known artists and art activities, or a co-op where some artists will collaborate to create an art exhibition together.
Art Scam #5 - Violation Warnings
This scam can target anyone, not just artists. This is how it works:
- You will receive an email saying that your social accounts have violated their terms of service or copyright.
- You will be asked to click the link to send an appeal or something like that.
- You will be redirected to a fake login screen where you have to enter your credentials to log in to your social accounts.
- Your accounts will be hacked with the information you have put in.
- The scammers will use your account to hack your friends’ accounts, ask them for money, or to scam other people.
How to Avoid Art Scams
It is better to protect yourself from scammers than to deal with them after you are scammed because you might not be able to get your social accounts or money back. Below are some tips that can help you avoid art scams:
- Double-check any links sent by others before opening them(even from a friend as their account might have been hacked before that). You can hover the links (or the text that has a link) on your laptop and see the domain name & the link at the bottom left of the screen.
- Don’t click the links or buttons in the email sent by strangers.
- Double-check the email address and domain name of the Email senders to make sure the email is actually from a legitimate company or service.
- Double-check the social accounts of the senders to see if the accounts are legit. Fake accounts usually are newly created, try to put a lot of content in a very short time (for example, 5 or more posts per day) to make it look contentful, and have a few friends. Their social ID looks like cloned accounts that have numbers such as john.doe137049. Some accounts look legit but they have been hacked by scammers.
- Set 2-factor authentication for your accounts.
- Be suspicious when someone seems to be generous to pay a lot for your artwork & to pay upfront.
If you know any other scams, please feel free to share in the comments so we can protect each other. Feel free to share this post so more people know about the scams to avoid them.
I will be sharing more art-related tips such as how to draw a face and how to paint with watercolor. If you are interested, sign up for my newsletter to get free tips and gifts via email.
