NORFOLK, Va. - One by one, people are getting their COVID-19 vaccine and vaccination record cards.
But now, consumer experts like Fakespot CEO and Founder Saoud Khalifah are warning about a scam involving fake vaccination cards being sold online.
“Store names like vaccinationcards.com, fakecards.com, things like that,” Khalifah told News 3.
“These ads look ridiculous, in a nutshell,” he added. “[They sell] anywhere between $30 to $100."
Khalifah said sellers will sell you either blank vaccination cards or ones counterfeited with stamp records.
“You can choose an option… do you want a Moderna? Do you want a Pfizer?” Khalifah said.
He added his company has seen fraudulent cards being sold on sites including eBay and Etsy and throughout the dark web.
“Those are now being sold on these stores everywhere on the internet that are powered by Shopify,” Khalifah said. “If you are in the crowd that does not want to get vaccinated but you want to travel, or you want to attend certain events that require this card, what do you do?”
“It's wrong. It's immoral. It's illegal,” North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein told News 3.
Stein and Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring are taking action. Recently, the two joined other attorneys general throughout the U.S. in sending letters to Twitter, eBay, Shopify and OfferUp, calling on them to stop fake vaccination cards being sold on their platforms.
“We've had conversations with them about doing a better job of policing their websites,” Stein said.
In a statement, Herring said in part, "Individuals who purchase fraudulent vaccine cards and go out into our communities pretending to be vaccinated could be detrimental to our efforts to curb the pandemic.”
Stein agrees.
“They can get the virus and they can transmit it to other people, and it means that we'll be suffering through this pandemic for a longer period of time,” he said. “That is in none of our interest.”
Which is why Stein and Khalifah both said it's important to get your card when you get your shot.
“Using a fake card to counterfeit your immunity is not the way to go,” Khalifah said.