The Lubbock Texas police department recently issued a warning about people receiving phony text messages that purport to be sent from Amazon telling you that your account has been hacked.  These phony text messages, called “smishing” will either attempt to lure you into providing personal information that will be used to make you a victim or identity theft or try to persuade you to click on a link that will download malware.

A famous bank robber was once asked why he robbed banks to which he responded, “because that is where the money is” which is why it is not surprising that scammers have used Amazon as the basis for a wide variety of scams due to so many people buying products through Amazon, particularly during the Coronavirus pandemic.

You can provide a phone number for Amazon to text you alerts and notifications regarding your account so how can you tell if a text message is legitimate?  The real Amazon will never ask for your password or personal information in a text message.

TIPS

If you have a question about your Amazon account, you can either contact them through their website at https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html or call them at 1 (888) 280-4331.  Don’t trust any text message that purports to be from Amazon.  If you think it might be legitimate, merely call them at 1-(888) 280-4331.

Here is a link to information Amazon provides about steps you can take to make your account more secure. https://www.amazon.com/b?ie=UTF8&node=21599686011

For those of you receiving the Scam of the day through an email, I just want to remind you that if you want to see the ever increasing list of Coronavirus scams go to the first page of the http://www.scamicide.com website and click on the tab at the top of the page that indicates “Coronavirus Scams.”  Scamicide has been cited by the New York Times as one of three top sources for information about Coronavirus related scams.

If you are not a subscriber to Scamicide.com and would like to receive free daily emails with the Scam of the day, all you need to do is sign up for free using this link. https://scamicide.com/scam-of-the-day/