Local law enforcement said they are seeing more and more people fall victim to fake posts about missing children on social media.Get the latest news stories of interest by clicking here.Officials said it’s especially easy to fall victim to this scam because scammers are preying on emotions. Who wouldn’t want to help a missing or endangered child?Officials are asking that you think twice before sharing these types of posts."What makes it an effective scam is it really pulls at your heartstring, and it is easy to do,” said Aaron Brilbeck with the Oklahoma County Sheriff’s Office. "Gosh, who wouldn't want to help the kid out, right?"With a simple click of a button, you can share it on your feed so your friends can help, too. The problem is the post is fake, and there is a child in need of your help.>> Download the KOCO 5 AppInstead, law enforcement said someone is trying to scam you and your friends."Once it goes viral, the people who posted it take down that initial post and replace it with a house for rent or a car for sale. Or they post a link, and you click on it, and now they have all your personal information,” Brilbeck said.The sheriff’s office said they’ve seen these scams on local social media pages. What’s worse, these fake posts can take away from the search for real missing children."We have thousands of missing children on our website that could use that same type of attention,” said John Bischoff, with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.Bischoff said the organization is all too aware of the fake posts."It's pretty disheartening trying to figure out why these fake images of children who are not missing are being shared,” Bischoff said.The sheriff’s office said they understand people are just wanting to help."We rely on the eyes and ears of the public to find kids when they are in danger. To have someone capitalizing on a missing child to con people out of money, it is horrible,” Brilbeck said.Officials said there are things you can do to stop yourself and others from becoming a victim. Before you share, check the profile of the person who originally made the post.Is their profile really new with a few other posts? Then, it might be a suspicious account.Officials said to also check with local news outlets and law enforcement pages to see if they have posted about it. Small extra steps you can take to try and stop these types of scams.Top HeadlinesShooting at Georgia high school leads to multiple victims, suspect in custodyOnline sports betting costs Americans twice as much in retirement, study saysOHP: Oklahoma City man died day after near drowning at Lake ThunderbirdPolice shoot suspects after fire breaks out at Edmond homePolice identify suspect, release new details after standoff at OKC home ends in shooting