MINNEAPOLIS -- As long as we've had big games, we've had people looking to make a fast buck off unsuspecting fans.
And as the Minnesota Vikings begin their playoff run, the Minneapolis Police Dept., Better Business Bureau and the Vikings organization are alerting football fans to watch out for counterfeit playoff tickets.
"The last game we had several operators from Chicago, Detroit and Milwaukee coming into this area to sell tickets," Lt. Kim Lund of the Minneapolis PD told KARE.
"We'll see the same thing and it'll get larger as the playoffs go forward."
If you run across a Vikings ticket on ticket card stock you'll know immediately it's a fake. Only electronic tickets and PDFs printed on 8.5-by-11 inch sheets of paper are accepted at the gate at US Bank Stadium.
"We have no hard ticket stock, so if you encounter a hard ticket stock out in the street you know that's counterfeit," Jeff Anderson of the Vikings told KARE. "That's the first thing you should be looking for."
He noted that the only authorized ticket outlets are the Vikings ticket office, Ticketmaster and the NFL TicketExchange.
He said if you buy through an online third-party vendor that resells tickets you should make sure it's a reputable business with a track record of recent, legitimate sales.
"One way to make sure it's a reputable seller, is to look for the Better Business Bureau logo, and when you click on that logo make sure it actually takes you to the Better Business Bureau site."
Lt. Lund also warned against dealing with people who ask you to pay for tickets online with money orders, cashier's checks or gift cards. She said using a credit card or PayPal provides the most protection against losing your money.
"If you pay through PayPal, that's always better than somebody that wants an eBay gift card. If somebody is asking you to pay them in gift cards, stay away from them," Lund advised.
Lund and Anderson also urged people to document the names and faces of scalpers, before paying for a ticket in person.
"While we don't advise you to buy on the street, if you absolutely feel you have to then take a photo with that person, with their ID, ask them to come with you to the gate to actually get into the stadium," Anderson said.
A new trend for counterfeiters is to make a hybrid ticket that's half phony and half real. The scam artists will cut-and-paste different seat or section numbers into PDFs of real tickets with legitimate bar codes.
So, the ticket buyer may get through the gate of the stadium only to discover that the seat doesn't exist or belongs to someone else.
"What we've been seeing is a lot of PDFs that have been altered, which is an easy one to do on a computer and then just print off," Lt. Lund explained.
"Take a good look at that ticket. Make sure everything is spelled correctly for starters, that it's the right stadium, the correct teams, the correct times, that the gate is the Verizon Gate, not the 'Verzion gate' -- that's one that we saw at the last game."
The Minneapolis Police have officers stationed at US Bank Stadium specifically to deal with fake tickets discovered at the gates, or in the stadium.