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Buying prescription drugs online is always risky regardless of whether you have a prescription or not. We have outlined these risks previously in our article about Online Pharmacy Scams, which include getting caught by law enforcement and receiving counterfeit drugs that can lead to lifelong health problems.
At ScamAdviser, we have noticed a scary trend of prescription drugs being sold online illegally for enabling abortions at home. We came across one such website - abortionpill247.com - selling drugs such as Mifepristone and Misoprostol without even requiring a prescription.
While the site tries to give the appearance that it is an American business, it seems quite clear that the store is actually being operated from India. Not only are the drugs being sold on the site of Indian origin, but the domain registration data also shows that the site was created from India.
Clicking on the ‘WhatsApp Us’ button on the website also makes it glaringly obvious that the business is run from India.
Analyzing DNS data gathered by DomainCrawler, we found that there are at least 8 other websites hosted on the same server. DNS information, specifically information on IP addresses, makes it possible to find websites that might belong to one owner.
Even though thousands of websites of different owners can have the same IP address when shared hosting is used, often sites with the same IP belong to one entity. This is especially true if there are not many of them as we see in the case of abortionpill247.com, where there are only nine domains on a single IP address.
Using the ‘Related Domains’ feature powered by DomainCrawler, we were able to identify 8 other websites hosted on the same server, implying that they may be related in some way, such as having the same owner.
Out of these, 4 websites are actively selling prescription abortion pills. Three of these sites - bestabortionpillonline.com, mtpkitmeds.com and netmeds247.com are also being operated from India.
These sites, too, are trying to create a facade of being based in the USA, but not only their domain data retrieved by DomainCrawler indicates India as a country of origin, also they provide Indian phone numbers for customer support.
They are running their business so openly that even apps like TrueCaller clearly display names like ‘Abortion Pills’.
Mtpkitmeds.com also claims that ‘we are delivering abortion pills from last 8 years around the globe’ even though the website is barely a year old.
Netmeds247.com even claims to have doctors on board. However, it does not seem like these are real people as the pictures are stock images. The names also appear to be fake as a male name has been used next to the image of a female.
There are only three reviews available for these sites, from which two claim that the site is a scam while the third is a positive review praising the site’s ‘customer care executive’.
The fourth site - mifeprexusa.com - varies slightly as the domain registration information shows that it is registered under the name of ‘INTERNATIONAL EVANGELIST RICHARD ASAMOAH AGYEMAN’ from Denver, Colorado.
A simple Google search for this name brings up a post on Stop419Scams.com containing a long list of similar sites illegally selling prescription abortion pills. You can view the thread containing the full list here.
The post also contains the link to a press release by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) about a woman from New York being sentenced for illegally smuggling these pills into the country.
All this information put together paints a shocking picture of prescription drugs for abortion being sold online openly and illegally through a network of hundreds of sites.
Needless to say, it is not a wise idea to engage with such online pharmacies, especially for something as serious as abortion. You never know what you’re getting and you could end up with potentially fatal medical complications if the wrong drugs are administered.
