[[[PLEASE MAKE CRYSTAL BELL THE SOLE BYLINE THANKS!]]]
A black market for fake vaccination cards is reaching epidemic proportions online.
Fraudsters have hawked the flipping of the three-to-four-inch cards on retail sites, including eBay, Etsy and Shopify, as well as on social media sites Facebook and TikTok, the New York Times reported this week.
The Post has meanwhile found dozens of online self-guides to print fake vaccination cards at home.
The forgery has erupted in recent weeks following the news that an official vaccination card could soon become an important requirement to travel by plane and attend events.
And sellers and buyers are violating federal law by falsifying the vaccination of documents and fraudulently displaying the Center Centers for Disease Control and Prevention logo, which appears in the top right corner of each card.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation has warned that counterfeiters can be prosecuted: ‘if you have not received the vaccine, do not buy fake vaccine tickets, do not make your own vaccine tickets, and do not fill in a blank vaccination card with false information. ”
“We recommend that you do not post photos of your vaccination card on social media sites,” the site warns.
According to Saoud Khalifah, the founder of Fakespot, which provides data analytics to detect counterfeit articles online, scammers have also sold fraudulent vaccine stamps.
“People post, ‘Do you want the Moderna or do you want the Pfizer stamp?'” He told The Post.
“The map determines where you can go and what you can do,” he said.
‘Some people may not want the vaccine, but want to go somewhere. So they will buy this fake vaccine card with a fake stamp and mislead them through the system. That’s a shame. “
Meanwhile, 46 attorneys general demanded that Twitter, eBay and Shopify act “immediately” to monitor their platforms and “immediately” take down jobs that sell fake cards.
In a statement to The Post, world market Etsy said they were “removing posts advertising the articles”.
And eBay told The Post that the company is “taking important measures to block or quickly remove items that make false health claims or that could be used to falsely represent a person who received the vaccine.”
As of December, eBay had removed about 50 million listings that violated their COVID-19 policies, ranging from toilet paper and disinfectant wipes to items that made false medical claims.