With the high cost of prescription drugs, many people are turning to buying their prescription drugs over the internet from foreign pharmacies, particularly in Canada where the prices are attractive and the quality control is good.  However, this presents an opportunity for scammers which they have recently been exploiting in multiple ways.  The first way is through phony online pharmacies which do not deliver the prescription drugs that they promise.  However, more insidious are the phony online pharmacies that gather your information purportedly in order to process your order, but then use that information to send phony Drug Enforcement Agency agents to your home or call you purporting to be DEA agents who threaten you with arrest unless you pay them thousands of dollars.

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Although it is still technically illegal to purchase prescription drugs from Canada either directly or over the internet, federal officials using enforcement discretion as provided by law generally do not get involved with prescription drug shipments for personal consumption.  The first thing anyone considering ordering prescription drugs from Canada should do is make sure that they are dealing with a legitimate Canadian pharmacy that requires a perscription from an American doctor.  It is easy to research this online.  Secondly, if anyone contacts you purporting to be from the DEA threatening arrest for your personal prescription drug purchases, ignore them.  They are scammers.  Presently the DEA has indicted eleven people operating out of the Dominican Republic for operating such a scheme and are working toward getting them extradited to the United States to face trial