Recently the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) issued a warning about an imposter scam that starts with a phone call that appears to come from your bank, Amazon or a tech company telling you about an urgent problem with your account and that your money is in jeopardy.  They then transfer you to someone they refer to as an FTC  “agent” to help resolve the non-existent problem.  The phony FTC agent even has a fake ID with a fake badge to confirm that they are legitimate.  They then convince you that unless you temporarily transfer money out of your bank account, you are in danger of losing your entire account.  They then provide you with an account to which you need to immediately transfer your funds.  Unfortunately, if you do transfer the funds as directed, you lose your entire bank account.

This is exactly what happened recently to Robby Jacobs, a youth soccer coach in Arizona who received such a call, purportedly from his bank, telling him that scammers had used his credit card to make a $1,300 purchase and that in order to protect his account, he needed to transfer it to an account the phony bank representative provided to him.  Unfortunately, but understandably, Jacobs fell for the scam and ended up losing his entire life savings.

TIPS

In regard to FTC agents, there is no such position.  The FTC does not have agents so anyone claiming to be one is a scammer.  It is easy for a scammer to counterfeit an ID and badge to make them appear legitimate, so even if you are presented such identification, you cannot trust it.

The biggest red flag in this type of scam is to remember that no bank or governmental agency will ever under any circumstances direct you to withdraw your funds and put them into another account provided by the scammer.

If you do receive a call, text message or phone call about a threat to your account, you can never be sure that the person contacting you as legitimate, so you should never provide personal information, make a payment or click on a link in any such communication.  Rather, if you think the communication may be legitimate, merely call your bank or other company involved at a phone number you know is accurate to find out the truth.

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