Avoiding scams is not rocket science. There are a few helpful tips that can help you to weed out scams and thus minimize your risk of being scammed. Most of the following tips are simply based on using common sense, a few other tips might require you to have some basic knowledge of websites.

The more the following rules apply the higher the chance is you're dealing with a scam.

• Never ever join an opportunity that you receive by spam. Scammers are often spammers. Genuine opportunities will never spam and have strict policies in place against spamming.
• If it looks to good to be true, it probably is.
• If you don't know the people behind an opportunity or if you can't verify their real names, don't join. People who have nothing to hide, hide nothing.
• If the program administrator(s) made great effort to hide his/her/their identity, e.g. they use secured email services like Mailvault.com or HushMail.com, no phone number, no address etc are listed on the site or in the promotional email, be very careful. If scammers run with your money it's very hard to find them.
• Check the account numbers of an opportunity. If they are relatively new so is the opportunity. New opportunities should be approached carefully.
• Do some basic due diligence on every opportunity you find interesting and see if the data you find makes any sense. Checking a whois report is a good place to start.
• Take your time to study/watch an opportunity. If an opportunity is good it will last and you'll have plenty of time to join.
• Subscribe to mailing lists/news groups/forums with a good reputation. Some list owners will warn you for obvious scams. Beware though, there are quite a few lists that focus on 'games' as well and they sometimes consider a clear ponzi to be a quick opportunity.
• Inquire with your associates what they invest in and ask them why. You migh also ask them which mailing lists they subscribed to. Subscribing to the oppsincome.com opportunity list is a good place to start.
• If an opportunity only accepts e-currencies, and therefor enjoy some anonimity, you should be careful. Opportunities accepting credit card payments for example are less likely to be a scam. There are real accounts with real names attached to the credit card payments. Be aware of credit card fraud though!
• Last but not least: use common sense when looking at an opportunity. If there's a story on the site that doesn't make a lot of sense you know you are being scammed. Oil companies offering investments in oil don't need the few dollars you and I have in our digital currency accounts. Not to mention the administrative work they would have, legal issues to deal with etc.

Happy investing!