As time goes by there are more scams designed to take your money. In just the past couple weeks, I have seen all of these. Please share these with everyone, especially anyone that would be vulnerable to the scams.
- Tampered Bank Account – People are receiving emails from Bank of America and other large banks telling them that due to recent suspicious activity their account has been frozen, and they need to login here to correct it. Many times, these people don’t even have an account with the bank, and they become concerned and follow the link, or if they do have an account, they think this is legitimate and follow the link. Some of these links can be keyloggers that will then infect your computer and keep track of your passwords etc. At the very least these links are to a page that looks like your bank, but it is not. It is just a page to capture your username and password. If you receive an email like his from a bank that you use, contact the bank through some other means. Call them on a number you have elsewhere or google the bank. If you do not have an account with this bank, you can call them and verify that they do not have an account in your name, but NEVER FOLLOW THE LINK IN THE EMAIL. This scam also works with Amazon, Ebay and other retailers.
- E-mailing for Cash – My wife recently received an e-mail from a former co-worker’s e-mail account that said she was traveling with her husband and they had some trouble and lost everything they had and needed $2500 to get home. Of course, my wife did not believe this since this former co-worker is not the type of person to travel like this and the text of the e-mail did not sound like something this person would write. She sent an e-mail to this person but didn’t reply to the e-mail that she had received. Sure enough her former co-worker wasn’t traveling and knew nothing about this except that she had received a few similar e-mails asking her about her travel situation.
- An elderly friend recently received a call from someone claiming to be their grandchild and said they had gotten into trouble in Mexico and needed $1500 for bail money. This person became confused and did send the money before they checked with this “grandchild’s” parents to verify the story. They did get taken and so do many other seniors by this scam.
- Phone scams are very popular, I frequently get robocalls from a number that claims to be my utility company telling me that due to no payment my service will be cutoff in 30 minutes unless I pay now over the phone. Since I always pay this bill, I know this is fake and I just hang up. If you get a call like this and you are not sure if your bill is paid, hang up and contact your utility company through a published number. Please know hat your utility company normally doesn’t call you, they will send you a letter. The IRS, Social Security or your local sheriff or police department will not call you and demand money over the phone.
- I have also heard of people setting up a fake Facebook page impersonating someone who has many friends and trying to add the person’s friends to the new account for the purpose of exploiting those friends in the future. If you get a friend request from someone who is already a friend, contact that person another way to verify if the request came from them.
These bring up an important point about Phishing scams; they send out thousands of e-mails and constantly make phone calls looking for their victims. Make sure your loved ones are aware of these types of scams and make sure you always check with a known source if you receive an e-mail, phone call or request similar to these.
