Watch out for fake postal money orders

The U.S. Postal Service has issued a warning about several scams involving U.S. postal money orders. Scam artists are targeting US citizens, as well as small Internet retailers and classified advertisers. The scams usually start off with an offer of easy money and ends up cheating the unsuspecting victims out of hundreds - and sometimes thousands - of dollars.

To check that a money order is authentic, hold it up to the light and look for Ben Franklin images repeated on the left side (top to bottom) and a dark security thread running (top to bottom) to the right of the Franklin watermarks, with the tiny letters "USPS" facing backward and forward. If either of these security features is not present, the postal money order is a fake.

For more on the scams, click here.