CloutZap Scam Review – If You Think You Have Nothing To Lose…

If you've been looking for a CloutZap review to see if this site is a scam or legit, you've definitely been doing the right thing. The internet has been filled with thousands of fake service websites offering easy tasks and easy money for years. Unfortunately, CloutZap is one of those fake sites. It's free to join, so people casually join in because they think they have nothing to lose, and that's the trap. I'd like to share with you my CloutZap review in which I reveal the truth about this fake service and the consequences of joining. Let's dig in.

What Is CloutZap?

CloutZap.com claims to be "the #1 Influencer Network" and offers to pay excessively high rewards for doing simple tasks. The taglines on the homepage read, "make $1,000 daily, make $500 today!" None of the tasks requires substantial effort, for example;

• Referring CloutZap to others on social media - $2 each time you place your referral link and $15 each time someone signs up via your link.
• Answering a (fake) survey for around $140 plus a gift card worth as much as $1,000.
• Promote CloutZap on YouTube for $45.
• Promote CloutZap on other social accounts (TikTok, Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram, etc.) for $20-$80 each time.
• Enter a (fake) daily prize draw for $100.

A bonus of $35 will be added to your account as soon as you sign up with CloutZap. So frankly, if you simply follow the instructions and complete as many tasks, you can certainly - and quite easily - make a few hundred dollars on your first day.

However, to "make" a few hundred dollars does not mean it's real money. The catches are;

1. CloutZap will never let you withdraw the money - because none of it is real!
2. You'll never receive or win any of the prizes - because they are all fake, too.
3. And this is a tricky one. To answer each survey and enter a prize draw, you'll be required to submit your personal data, which will then be sold to third parties. By doing so, you are exposing yourself to security risks.

In other words, CloutZap is part of a data harvesting scam. These people falsely promise to pay money just to get you to sign up. You're not getting a single cent paid but soon you'll start receiving unsolicited emails, texts, and cold calls from companies that you've never heard of. If you want to know what they're really doing to deceit users, I can elaborate on this a little for you in the next section.

How It Really Works

So CloutZap is affiliated with fake marketing companies (i.e. data harvesting scammers). Here's how they deceptively collect your sensitive personal information and pass it on from one to another.

• CloutZap tells you that it'll pay a lot of money - just to entice you to sign up.
• It also tells you that it'll pay you for referring your friends/social followers, to get as many people to sign up.
• It offers to pay you a lot of money for answering surveys (other "tasks" also include testing free apps, watching videos, etc.)
• When you click to start answering a survey, you'll be directed to a third-party marketing agency's site.
• Before you complete a survey, you'll be required to fill out a form (your full name, email address, street address, phone number...and so on.) 
• Your personal detail is all the marketing agency wants. The survey questions are made up, the rewards such as gift cards, brand new smartphones, game consoles never exist in the first place. Once they've got your detail, they will pay a small amount of commission to CloutZap, usually around $1-$2.

So you know by now why CloutZap won't pay you - because it's not making enough money. You complete one (fake) survey and CloutZap will receive up to $2 from the agency. But it promises that it'll pay you as much as $140... How can it pay that much? It really can't. There is no money to pay.

Your Withdrawal Request Will Be Rejected

When your CloutZap account balance has reached $100, you'll be eligible to cash it out. You can choose a payment method from a dropdown list; PayPal, CashApp, Venmo, Bitcoin, Ethereum, or by mailed check. 

What CloutZap and all other similar scammers do is to make a simple excuse and refuse your withdrawal request. You may notice the "fraud policy" page (cloutzap.com/fraud-policy) where it states some prohibited actions, such as;

• Clicking your own referral link
• Buying traffic service to send fake visitors
• Deleting your social posts to promote CloutZap, etc.

CloutZap uses this fraud policy page for two purposes; one is to purposely make the site look legit, and the other one is to refuse to pay any user in the name of the fraud policy. When you request withdrawal of your earnings, it will come back to say, "we have found some unauthentic activities on your account. As per our fraud policy, you'll be ineligible to be paid." Soon your access to your CloutZap will be blocked, and that'll be the end of it.

Targeting Schoolkids

The tagline on the homepage also reads, "Earn money at school, make $500 today!" Not just CloutZap but most of the other similar scammers such as CloutBucks, CloutBonus, Tap2Cash, SurveyJ, SpininCash, and so on, have been targeting schoolkids over the past few years. And there's a reason for it.

If you've been researching ways to make money online, or even if you are just a decent adult, you can instantly tell that CloutZap's suggestion is far too good to be true. That's why it makes sense if it's mainly scamming schoolchildren who have yet to have a sense of financial value.

Imagine this. In some countries, $500 is equivalent to a few months' worth of wages, that's a fact. People struggle to work long hours or cannot find any job even though they own a smartphone and an internet connection. The CloutZap site claims to pay just anyone a few months' wages just for sharing a link here & there and answering easy surveys. No chance, is there? 

A Real Signup Bonus and A Fake Signup Bonus

CloutZap claims to pay $35 just for signing up. And millions of other web stores and brands also give out signup bonuses. Their bonuses are real. CloutZap's bonus is fake. What's the difference?

The difference is, nobody gives out cash for nothing. The bonus that brands and retailers offer upon signing up is only deductible when you purchase something from them. So the "bonus" is a way of discount, you see? For businesses, signup is to get you to become a prospect, i.e. a customer. 

No legitimate business would let you sign up for free and walk away with cash, right? That would be throwing money away. But that's what CloutZap is claiming - to just give out cash to random people, regardless of their background or where they live in the world. If it was true, it would be hugely unethical (donate it to charity instead!) therefore it's impossible, it's fake.

Fake Profile

Now, here's what you should do when you come across a site that claims to offer high rewards that seem too good to be true. 

Find out who's behind it. The name of the creator, director, seller...whatever the name of the individual who founded the site. If you find the name, google the name and see what others say about that person.

So who owns CloutZap? No information appears anywhere. The legal pages (terms & conditions, privacy policy) say that the company is located in the Netherlands, "CloutZap, PTY, Amsterdam, Noord-Holland." But "PTY", short for "proprietary" is used in countries such as Australia and South Africa, not in the Netherlands. So this is clearly false information.

The "About Us" page says the site was born in 2017, but the domain registry information reveals that the domain "cloutzap.com" was only first registered in October 2021. So this graph and other claims also prove to be fake.

Fake Payment Proofs

You know, you can fabricate "payment proofs" easily by using free graphic software online? The scammers are especially good at creating them because they're so accustomed to doing so. This social user's photo, for example, is fake as it's been used over & over again by multiple fake Instagram users over time. 

YouTube Testimonials

The video testimonials, on the other hand, may be real, because the users are promised $45 for posting the video.

They're told exactly what to do and what to say on the video.

Little do they know as yet is that they're actually not getting any cash from CloutZap. This is so bad for teenage social influencer wannabes, isn't it? They're recommending a scammer to their followers without being able to explain where the money comes from (comes from nowhere!) They're only embarrassing themselves. 

Fake "Surveys For Cash"

You can easily tell that these "surveys" listed on CloutZap are fake, mainly for the following 3 reasons;

#1 High Payout Rates

The payout rates are way too high. Usually, a legitimate survey-for-cash only pays out 10-15 cents for answering a set of questions that takes you 10 minutes or longer. Some offer higher rates as much as $1 per survey, but the availability is extremely limited, very rare. Whereas CloutZap offers up to $140 per survey....that's 1,000+ times more than usual. Obviously fake!

Legitimate surveys are run by research companies. They're only looking for genuine answers from genuine people, right? So they're not supposed to pay a lot of money, otherwise, people would start to answer as many questions in a short time just to earn money, you see.

#2 Gifts of High Value

The tasks listed in CloutZap offer gifts of high value, such as game consoles and gift cards of as much as $500-$1,000. Some of them say "Win Playstation", pretending to be a prize competition, whereas others say "Get $1,000 Amazon Gift Card!" which may sound like they're giving away the gift cards to every participant. 

No. When a legitimate company gives away such a gift of high value, there should be a reason, and the giveaway event should be approved by the brand. The giveaway (or the prize competition) should be part of a promotion campaign. They would never throw their valuable assets away by donating stuff to some random users on the internet like that.

#3 Surveys Should Be Answered Anonymously

And most importantly, a legitimate survey never asks for your personal information such as your name and address. Because a survey is a survey, it should be answered anonymously. They may ask about your age group, your living environment, your monthly salary, and so on. But never sensitive information, not even your name.

If it was a real prize competition, they may ask for your email address, but nothing else that's personal. They would only need the winner's address, not every participant's. Collecting personal data from the public that way in the name of a "survey" is a breach of data protection.

Is CloutZap a Scam?

So far, I have been referring to CloutZap as a "scam" out of convenience.

But a scam is usually where someone sells the wrong product fraudulently, or takes money out of you unlawfully, so when you're scammed, a financial loss is usually involved.

With CloutZap, you can join in for free, and you'll never be charged any money. The only thing you'll lose is your precious time. So technically, CloutZap is not directly scamming you.

However, the more fake surveys you complete, the more spammers you will give your information to. They'll resell it constantly, so you have no idea where it will end up. If a hacker buys it, they could access your bank using your full address. They could borrow a large sum of money from a lender using your name, you really never know.

Just because CloutZap is free to join doesn't mean there's nothing to lose and you can play around with it.

Can I Ever Claim The Money I've Earned?

No, you can't. Because you haven't really "earned" money from CloutZap. In other words, you never did any work for which you should have been paid. If you were to pursue a lawsuit against CloutZap, claim your reward, and successfully win, the judge would consider the market rates and order CloutZap to pay accordingly. You'd probably be paid 10-20 cents for answering each survey because that's what a survey-for-cash is worth. You wouldn't be paid $140 as advertised on the CloutZap site just because it had promised so. 

What I mean is - what you can take away from it is - you've been lied to and you were dumb enough to believe it! There's no such easy way to make money online. You'll only get paid for all the learning, time, and effort you put in.