Some people are traveling several miles to Presque Isle State Park for a holiday lights display, but some are feeling duped once they get here because of a social media scam.
There’s a saying that you shouldn’t always believe what you see, and we know in today’s day and age, that means especially what you see on Facebook.
The Presque Isle Lights event kicked off over the weekend but an unofficial Facebook account created an ad which falsely marketed the event.
“We created a Facebook event, of course an official event for ‘Presque Isle Lights 2021’, and we also noticed though that there was another Facebook event out there for Presque Isle Lights,” Jon DeMarco, the Executive Director of Presque Isle Partnership said.
Presque Isle Partnership had to put out a separate Facebook post to warn visitors of this fake events page by “World Explore Virtual Tour Live.”
DeMarco said the page was getting thousands and thousands of shares, that’s why he came across it.
“And the photo that was being used was actually a photo from Hershey Park and their light show,” he said. “Which is far beyond what we are doing here at Presque Isle because we have a fine line and we want to keep that balance of nature and the lights.”
Over the weekend at the start of the light event, DeMarco saw lots of cars with out of town plates, some that traveled hours to get here for what they thought was an event much bigger and brighter than what our free state park light event actually offers.
“I did not understand why someone would do this,” DeMarco said.
He spent the weekend dealing with disappointed and even angry visitors who were expecting what they saw in the photos. And his message to the community is to report this fake page if you see it and always be cautious of online scams.
“Do your research and understand that this is the Presque Isle Partnership’s event,” he said. “It is an annual fundraiser for us and is our second year and although it might not be to the caliber of a Hershey Park or an Ogle Bay West Virginia type light show, it is a long term investment and we would like it to continue to grow over the years.”
He said they still want families to come out and enjoy everything their light show has to offer Thursdays-Sundays through Christmas, but they don’t want anybody to be disappointed due to these false advertisements.
He is not sure at this time exactly why a fake account would have been made, but he does warn it could be to try to scam people and make them add their credit card info.
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Haley Potter, “Presque Isle Lights Event Falls Victim to Facebook”. Erie News Now, Scampresque-isle-lights-event-falls-victim-to-facebook-scam
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