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Scammed! That's what happened to several Web surfers who applied for an auto loan at the Allstate Auto Lending Web site, police say. I spoke with four of the people who are claiming that they were ripped off by this site, and they say they lost between $650 and $1500 each. They maintain that the operator of the Web site took their money--and their hopes for a new car--and vanished.

"I play it pretty safe online, and really never thought I would end up being the person that this would happen to," says Karen Maxwell, a human resources manager from the Bronx, in New York City. Like each of the people I spoke to, Maxwell says she found Allstate Auto Lending listed as an advertiser in the sponsored links section of Yahoo's search results. She applied for a loan on the site and was approved. She was instructed to wire $941 to "Bill Wallace"--the person listed as the operator of the Allstate Auto Lending Web site, which claims to be based in Santa Cruz, California. That $941 is long gone.

Maxwell is one of several people who told me that Allstate Auto Lending lured them into handing over their money by offering low interest rates and easy credit approvals for an auto loan.

"This is without question a scam that deceived and took advantage of high-risk borrowers," says Zach Friend, a spokesperson for the Santa Cruz Police Department. Friend says his department has received 6 complaints against the site, which is no longer operational. Those complaints have been forwarded to the Texas State Attorney General's office, where the operator of the Web site is believed to be based, he says. The Santa Cruz Better Business Bureau, too, has received 12 complaints over the last four months alleging that Allstate Auto Lending took money from consumers and disappeared.

AWOL Auto Loan Firm

All of the alleged victims I talked to say they were approved for a car loan through a credit application they filled out at Allstate's site. When their application was approved, they were told to put about 5 percent of the loan amount in escrow as an insurance policy, should they default on the loan. Each of them handed over their Social Security number, their bank account information, and a copy of their driver's license. They were then told to use a money-wiring service called Moneygrams to send their escrow payment to Palm Bank in Bradenton, Florida.

The problem? There is no Palm Bank in Bradenton, Florida. The money reportedly went instead to a prepaid Visa credit card account. Friend suspects no one will ever get their money back.

Even the Web Savvy Are Fooled

Geoffrey Kogler, a New Jersey-based air traffic controller for the U.S. Air Force, says the day he went down to pick up a black Chevy S-10 pickup truck at the dealer was the day he realized he'd been ripped off for $750.

"I felt stupid," Kogler says. He says that Allstate Auto Lending told him that it would transfer the money needed to buy the car he wanted directly to the dealership selling it. All Kogler would have to do was pay the $750 escrow payment to Allstate Auto Lending, and then he could pick up the car the next day.

"Not only am I out the money, but this guy has everything he needs to steal my identity," Kogler says.

As naïve a mistake as these folks may have made, don't write them off as Internet rubes who deserve what they got. After interviewing them, I found that they had been online for years and considered themselves Web savvy. Most were comfortable paying bills and banking online. And most didn't fit the profile I conjure up as the type of person who falls for what is known as an advance-fee loan scam.

My point is this: Even if you consider yourself an experienced Internet user, you need to keep your guard up. The good news is that for any Net surfer, no matter how experienced or inexperienced, there are tools to help and a checklist of pitfalls to watch out for online.

Learn From Their Mistakes

Lakewood, New York, resident Dawn Hammond, like the other people I interviewed, found Allstate Auto Lending listed in Yahoo's search results. Hammond says she was scammed to the tune of $847. Like the others, she says the fact that Allstate Auto Lending was advertising on Yahoo led her to trust the site.

That was their first mistake: It's important to scrutinize online advertisers as closely as you would any site you find using a search engine. A study coauthored by McAfee and antispyware activist Ben Edelman found that 9 percent of sponsored results from top search engines, including Yahoo, lead to Web sites that contain spyware and scams, and could be operated by people who send spam.

McAfee offers a free Internet Explorer and Firefox browser add on called SiteAdvisor that puts little green, yellow, and red caution icons next to search results' sites and sponsored links when it thinks you should be wary of them. Such a tool could have prevented Hammond and others from doing business with a disreputable or unknown company.

Fake Logos or Lack Thereof

Another reason that the people I spoke with said they trusted Allstate Auto Lending's Web site was because it had the Better Business Bureau's BBBOnLine Reliability logo on it.

The logo suggested that the site had been endorsed by the BBB as reliable, says Andrea, an Arizona resident who says she lost $1493 to Allstate Auto Lending. (I agreed to honor Andrea's request not to identify her hometown or use her last name.)

The BBB does have a BBBOnLine Reliability seal program, but Allstate Auto Lending is not part of that program--despite the fact that it displayed the logo, says Zach Vander Meeden, a BBB spokesperson. In fact, the only affiliation the site has with the BBB is 12 complaints filed against it to the Santa Cruz Better Business Bureau, he says. Those complaints claim the site never delivered on loans after customers wired the firm money.

You should always click on the BBB logo presented at a site. Any company worth its salt should link you directly to its BBBOnLine report for your review. If the BBB logo doesn't link directly to a report, visit the BBB's Web site and look up the company yourself.

Another visual clue to look for is a browser icon that looks like a padlock in the bottom corner of your browser. If the padlock is locked, that means the site uses an encryption system called Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) to protect customer information that is typed online and transmitted across the Internet. Allstate Auto Lending didn't utilize this security measure--another cause for concern given the sensitive information the online application asked for.

You also shouldn't be fooled by official-looking paperwork. Hammond said she downloaded Allstate Auto Lending's paperwork and took it to both her bank and the car dealership. "I wanted to get their opinion as to whether the company looked legitimate," Hammond says. She says her bank and the dealership said the paperwork looked fine, and both suggested going with Allstate Auto Lending because neither of the potential lenders could offer a better deal.

Been There, Done That

Kogler--the New Jersey-based air traffic controller--says securing loans over the Internet was old hat for him. He was hoping that this would be the third successful loan he applied for and received through an Internet-based financial institution.

The lesson here: Always be vigilant when doing anything over the Internet when it concerns your personal and financial information. Unsavory opportunists prey on consumers, hoping to scam you into thinking they are someone you can trust.

Typically, scammers try to weasel their way to your money by pretending to be one of your financial institutions--sending you an e-mail prompting you to take some sort of action with your account. This, they hope, will lure you to a fake site (also known as a "phishing" site) that masquerades as the official site, where your account information is requested and then stolen.

A good antiphishing toolbar can go a long way toward preventing you from making a costly mistake. You can also update your Firefox browser to the most recent version, which includes built-in antiphishing technology to warn you of dangerous sites. Internet Explorer 7 also includes built-in antiphishing safeguards.

Take Your Time Shopping

My last tip: Don't rush into anything online. Kogler says he was hoping to get his loan from Allstate Auto Lending so he could buy a new car to take home for an upcoming vacation. In retrospect, if he hadn't been in such a rush to buy a car, he says, he might have had more time to scrutinize who he was about to hand over his money to.

"I thought I would be driving to upstate New York in a new Chevy pickup," says Kogler. "Instead I got ripped off and had to drive my motorcycle in the rain."

Each of the other people I interviewed was also in a hurry to buy a car. I can't help but think that their rush to take advantage of what they thought was a good deal caused them to let their guard down just enough to allow a company to take advantage of them.

Avoid getting stuck in the rain yourself the next time you buy online, and be prepared and do your homework. If you end up a victim of a scam, you can file complaints to numerous consumer watchdog and law enforcement agencies.

The Texas Attorney General's office declined to comment on any investigation into Allstate Auto Lending. However, the office urges anyone who has a problem with the company to file a complaint online.

You can also file a complaint about a suspected online scam with the Internet Crime Complaint Center, which is a joint venture of the FBI and the National White Collar Crime Center. In addition, you can register a complaint with the BBB, which not only will keep your complaint on file, but will also try to resolve the complaint.

In cases like Allstate Auto Lending, unfortunately, you may have little hope of recovering your money. But your complaint will alert authorities to take action against the firm--which just may prevent others from getting ripped off.