I just about fell for an internet scam today.

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Here's what happened:

I pay for the ad free version of HULU.  I was watching Angel Has Fallen, and it kept feeding me ads.  So, I tried to get a hold of HULU.  (The PROPER HULU help line is help.hulu.com.  I hit Huluhelp.com. )

Right away things were hinky, but it didn't fully hit me until about 3/4 of the way through the call.  They didn't ask for any kind of account information, they text me saying they found the problem and it was a payment problem, and by the end of the call, they tried to get me to put a $100 apple card in my Walmart shopping cart saying that it was ok because I had already paid for it.

Here's how they almost got me:

The verification texts.

Tammie Toren
Tammie Toren
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Fake verification text

Here's what I should have noticed on the scammer web page:

The website that gave me the number to call said it wasn't secure.

It also said at the top of the page that the website HULU HELP might be for sale and I could click there to check.

I was in such a hurry, I didn't see either of those things until I went back to see if there was anything hinky on the site.

Tammie Toren
Tammie Toren
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Fake HULU

The real page is help.hulu.com

Here's what they did to make me leave the call:

They had me download an app they said would give them access to my HULU account.

Then they said it was a payment problem.  (It wasn't.  My payment was due and paid last week.)

Then, I thought I'd try the one thing that makes customer service hang up every time.  I said the F word.  I didn't just say it, I strung it up with a bunch of other cuss words just to see what they guy would do.  He just text me, "You don't have to pay for any card."  and said that proved it wasn't a scam, and I should buy the card.

Then I hung up on the guy.

What I did afterwards:

I made sure anything that they had me do was deleted, and I changed my HULU password and my phone password, just in case.

Then I called the real HULU and told them what was up.  HULU was surprised and told me it was most certainly a scam and thanked me for the heads up.

Then I called my mom and told her my story.  She always thinks they scam her because she's older and doesn't know technology that well.  That's not it at all.  They're just really good at what they do.

These scammers don't realize that what they're doing takes so much brain work that if they tried doing something legal, they could probably rule the freaking world.

LOOK: The biggest scams today and how you can protect yourself from them

Using data from the BBB Scam Tracker Annual Risk Report, Stacker identified the most common and costly types of scams in 2022.

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