Scam of the Day
Scam of the day – March 1, 2026 – Conduent Data Breach: Safepay Ransomware Attack Exposes 25 Million Victims’ Sensitive Personal Information
Conduent Incorporated is a company with which you may not be familiar, but the company recently began notifying victims of a data breach it suffered at the hand of the ransomware gang Safepay in which personal information of more than 25 million people was compromised. The compromised information was particularly sensitive, including name addresses, birth dates, Social Security numbers, medical information and health insurance details which can be used by scammers for identity theft, medical fraud and targeted scams. Conduent is a business process services and digital solution company that works with more than 600 government agencies, electronic toll systems and private companies including Blue Cross Blue Shield, Humana and Volvo Group North America.
Conduent is notifying victims by snail mail so if you do receive such a letter, it is legitimate. Here is a link to the letter that includes an offer of free identity theft monitoring. chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://www.mass.gov/doc/2026-150-conduent-business-services-llc/download
TIPS
Victims of this data breach should freeze their credit if they have not already done so. Actually, freezing your credit is actually something everyone should do. It is free and easy to do. In addition, it protects you from someone using your identity to obtain loans or make large purchases even if they have your Social Security number. If you have not already done so, put a credit freeze on your credit reports at all of the major credit reporting agencies. Here are links to each of them with instructions about how to get a credit freeze:
https://www.transunion.com/credit-freeze
https://www.experian.com/freeze/center.html
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Scam of the day – February 28, 2026 – FBI Warns of Outdated Routers: How to Protect Your Smart Home and IoT Devices
The Internet of Things is made up of a broad range of devices connected to the Internet including home thermostats, security systems, medical devices, refrigerators, televisions, cars and toys. Our homes have become filled with these devices including Alexa and Siri. The FBI has longed warned consumers about the dangers presented by hacking of various devices that makeup the Internet of Things.
Cybercriminals hack into your devices that are a part of the Internet of Things to enable them to enlist your devices as a part of a botnet by which they can distribute malware while maintaining their anonymity. They also can hack into your Internet of Thing devices to access your home computers or cell phones to steal information for purposes of identity theft or to implant malware on your home computers and cell phones. The risks are extreme, but there are some basic steps you can take to protect yourself.
The key to protecting yourself is having a secure router. The router is the networking device that is used to transfer data between your computer and the Internet. Last May the FBI issued a warning about 13 outdated, end-of-life routers, particularly routers manufactured before 2010 that are no longer supported by their manufacturers with software updates and patches to fix vulnerabilities. Cybercriminals, particularly Chinese cybercriminals are exploiting the lack of security of these routers to gain access to your computers and other devices and install malware and make it part of a botnet.
TIPS
In addition to replacing end-of-life routers with newer more secure routers there are also other steps you should be taking to provide better security. Disable remote management settings on your routers and make sure you are using a strong password as well as encryption. Also, make sure you are not using the default factory-set username and password, which would make your router quite vulnerable.
Configure network firewalls to block traffic from unauthorized IP addresses and disable port forwarding. Make sure that you install the latest security patches as soon as they become available. Use encryption software for the transmission of data and find out where data is stored and what steps are taken to secure the information.
Finally, make sure your router is secure and use its whitelisting capabilities which will prevent your device from connecting to malicious networks. Routers are a critical part of your smart home security. Make sure it will automatically download and install the latest security updates from its manufacturer. If your router is an older router that does not have this capability, you can check the manufacturer’s website regularly for the latest updates, but frankly, you are probably better served by getting a newer, more secure router. Make sure you have a unique password for each of your Internet of Things devices and use dual factor authentication whenever you can for all of these devices.
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Scam of the day – February 27, 2026 – AOL Phishing Email Scam
Today’s Scam of the day is about a phishing email presently circulating that attempts to lure you into clicking on a link in order to continue using your AOL account. Millions of people still use AOL. One reason for this is that you get greater email privacy when compared to some other email carriers. Due to its popularity, scammers and identity thieves often send out phishing emails that appear to come from AOL, such as the one reproduced below that was sent to me by a Scamicide reader. If you click on the link in the email one of two things can occur and both are bad. Either you will end up providing personal information to an identity thief or you will, merely by clicking on the link, download dangerous malware such as ransomware on to your phone, computer or other device. I have deactivated the link.
Here is the email presently being circulated.
“Dear AOL Member, We recently upgraded our network server. The new AOL version of our software will be available on March 1, 2026.The new edition contains several changes. Your AOL account needs to be updated to avoid being disconnected
Please click on the link below to update your account now
Update Now
Regards,
© 2026 AOL Communications. All Rights Reserved.”
TIPS
When AOL communicates with its customers about their accounts, they do so by AOL Certified Mail, which will appear as a blue envelope in your inbox and will have an official AOL Mail seal on the border of the email. No official AOL Mail seal appears in the inbox for this phishing email. Also, this email also does not refer to you in the salutation, but merely addresses you as “Dear User.” In addition, the scammer was not very smart because the email that was intended to appear as if it was coming from AOL came from a yahoo.com email address.
Whenever you get an email, you cannot be sure who is really sending it. In the case of this email, the email address of the sender had no relation to AOL and most likely was the email address of someone whose email account was hacked and made a part of a botnet of computers used by cybercriminals to send such communications. Never click on a link unless you are absolutely sure that it is legitimate. If you think the email might be legitimate, the best thing to do is to contact the real company that the email purports to be from at an email address or phone number that you know is accurate in order to find out if the communication was legitimate or not.
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Scam of the day – February 26, 2026 – Beware the Fake Stolen Car Reward Scam: How Criminals Steal Your Bank Information
Scammers take photos of cars and then post them on social media indicating that the car has been stolen and that a thousand dollar reward is being offered for information about the whereabouts of the car. When people respond to the social media post with information about the “stolen” car, they are then instructed to provide their bank account number and bank routing number in order to have the reward sent to their bank account.
Unfortunately, once the scammer has your bank account number and the routing number for your bank which is used for wire transfers, they are able to use that information to make purchases where money is wired from your account and the goods purchased are sent to the scammer who then can sell the goods thereby laundering the proceeds of the scam. Some scammers will even use your banking information to set up recurring payments such as for utilities.
TIPS
Never give your bank account information to anyone or any company that you have not thoroughly researched to make sure that they are legitimate. In fact, if you are a bit paranoid, like me (remembering even paranoids have enemies) you can avoid the problem altogether by not providing your bank account information to anyone and have payments sent to you by a check.
If, however, you do become a victim of this type of scam where a scammer has your bank account information, freeze your accounts immediately and notify the police and the fraud department of your bank. Change your online banking password and make sure you are using dual factor authentication as well.
The good news is that for this type of wiring of funds fraud, you are not liable for the money withdrawn from your account if you notify the bank within 60 days of when you receive your monthly statement. Frankly you should notify your bank within 60 seconds of receiving your monthly statement indicating the crime. Banks are required to investigate the crime promptly and replace the money into your account within one business day of determining that the loss of funds from your account was fraudulent.
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Scam of the day – February 25, 2026 – Turbo Tax Imposter Scam
With the due date for filing you federal income tax return approaching, many people are filing their taxes at this time with almost 94% of individual income tax returns being filed electronically. TurboTax is a popular online tax preparation service and so identity thieves will take advantage of that popularity and call people posing as TurboTax employees informing the targeted victim that his or her electronically filed income tax return has been rejected by the IRS. The identity thief then attempts to lure you into providing personal information including your Social Security number that will be used to make you a victim of identity theft.
In order to make their call appear legitimate, the identity thieves will use a technique called “spoofing” to manipulate your Caller ID so that the call looks like it has come from TurboTax.
TIPS
As I often say, trust me, you can’t trust anyone, particularly someone who asking for you to provide sensitive personal information. In this case it is important to unote that TurboTax will not call you if your tax return has been rejected unless you have specifically requested a call. If you do receive such a call and think that it might be legitimate, merely hang up and call TurboTax at its customer service number of 1-800-446-8848..
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Scam of the day – February 24, 2026 – Romance Meets Crypto Fraud: Inside the Explosive Growth of Pig‑Butchering Scams
I have been warning you about romance scams for many years. More recently I have been warning you about cryptocurrency scams since 2017. In the last few years a new scam combining the romance scam and cryptocurrency scams has surfaced.
Romance scams generally follow a familiar pattern with the scammers establishing relationships with people, generally women, online through various legitimate dating websites and social media using fake names, locations and images. In the last few years the FBI identified a trend in romance scams in which the scammer tells his victim that he or she has inside knowledge about cryptocurrency investing and directs the victim to a phony website that purports to be a legitimate cryptocurrency trading site. Not long after “investing” in the cryptocurrencies provided, the victim soon finds that there is no investment and that she or he has lost all of the invested money. This scam originated in China in 2019 and is called sha zhu pan or pig butchering in English. The name is derived from the practice of luring in victims, “fattening them up” by convincing them to continually “invest” more money and then stealing all of the money.
The scammers initially contact their victims on dating or social media apps and pretend to develop a close relationship. After a while the scammer informs the targeted victim that he or she is making a lot of money investing in cryptocurrencies and suggests the victim download and use a cryptocurrency app used by the scammer. Generally, the victims are lured into investing more and more money by what appears to be both dramatic increases in the value of their account and their ability to withdraw some of their profits. However, once the victim has been persuaded to invest larger and larger sums of money, the scammers steal the money and the victim is left with nothing.
You might be surprised to learn that typically the victims of this scam are highly educated people. Unfortunately, they also are targeted because they may have also recently gone through a divorce or some other personal difficulty. While the victims are people of all ages, most victims are anywhere from their mid-30s to their early fifties with the average loss per victim averaging $121.926 with one victim, according to the IRS losing two million dollars to the scammers.
Recently New York Attorney General Letitia James issued a warning about the dangers of pig butchering in which she mentions how many pig butchering scammers request their victims to communicate with them exclusively on WeChat, WhatsApp or other encrypted platforms to make it more difficult for law enforcement to trace who they are.
TIPS
It is important to remember that you should never invest in something that you do not completely understand. This was a mistake that many of Bernie Madoff’s victims made. Cryptocurrency scams quite often involve complicated language and investment terms that is purposefully unclear in an effort to confuse potential investors from understanding the real facts. You also may want to check out the SEC’s investor education website at www.investor.gov. Scammers can be very convincing and it may sound like there is a great opportunity for someone to make some money, but you must be careful that the person making money is not the scam artist taking yours.
Also, the apps used in the pig butchering scam may appear to be legitimate, but they are not found on official app platforms such as Google Play or the Apple App Store. Do your homework before investing in cryptocurrencies and only do business with well established cryptocurrency exchanges. Never invest merely because of the recommendation of someone you may have met online.
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Scam of the day – February 23, 2026 – FBI Warns of Rising Gold Bar Scams Targeting Seniors: How the Scheme Works and How to Stay Safe
Last Fall, I told you that the Boston office of the FBI had issued a warning scams involving people lured under false pretenses to cash in their savings, buy gold bars and deliver the gold to scammers. According to recent FBI figures this scam is getting worse with more than $262 million lost to this scam between January and October of 2025. I have been warning people about this scam since I described it in the Scam of the day for May 7 2024 when I told you about Ravinkle Mathon who was convicted in Maryland of attempting to scam an elderly man out of $200,000 in an elaborate scam that has increased dramatically in the last year. The scam began with a phone call from Mathon to an elderly man in which Mathon posed as a federal agent telling the targeted victim that his identity had been stolen and that he needed to protect his savings by withdrawing all of his funds, purchasing gold with the funds and then turn the gold over to the alleged scammer for safe keeping. Fortunately, a family member of the targeted victim became aware of the scam and notified police who set up a sting and arrested Mathon when he came to collect the gold..
With the value of gold increasing, scammers have increasingly turned to this type of scam. According to the FBI, many of the perpetrators of this crime are foreigners who have little difficulty leaving the country with gold bars. In other instances the scam may originate by phone overseas with money mules in the United States picking up the gold.
TIPS
The primary thing to keep in mind in order to avoid this scam is to remember that no government agency or legitimate business will ever request that you purchase gold or other precious metals for any purpose and certainly not to protect them from criminals nor will they tell you that you need to provide the gold to government agents for safekeeping.
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Scam of the day – February 22, 2026 – Publishers Clearing House Scam Strikes Again
It has only been a few weeks since I last warned you about a Publishers Clearing House Lottery scam, but unfortunately this scam is back in the news with the recent arrest of Oral Durloo and Brandon Naime who are accused of scamming a 92 year old New York man out of $250,000. Durloo and Naime are accused by Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney of contacting their victim by phone posing as representatives of Publishers Clearing House and telling him that he won $18 million, but that he had to pay $250,000 in taxes and fees in order to claim his prize. According to DA Tierney, Durloo and Naime then drove their victim to his bank where he obtained a $250,000 cashier’s check that he turned over to the Durloo and Naime. In the last few years there has been an increase in reports of scammers calling people on the telephone and telling them that they have won one of the Publishers Clearing House lotteries, but that they have to pay fees or taxes before being able to claim their prize. In addition there are reports of targeted victims receiving phony notifications by regular mail that they have won a Publishers Clearing House lottery, but that again they must pay fees or taxes before being able to receive their prize.
It is hard to win any lottery. It is impossible to win one that you have not even entered and yet scam artists have found that it is extremely lucrative to scam people by convincing them that they have won various lotteries. With so many people entered into the Publishers Clearing House lotteries, it is easier for scammers to convince people that they have won.
Most lottery scams involve the victim being told that they need to pay taxes or administrative fees directly to the lottery sponsor; however no legitimate lottery requires you to do so. As with many effective scams, the pitch of the scammer may seem legitimate. Income taxes are due on lottery winnings, but with legitimate lotteries they are either deducted from the lottery winnings before you receive your prize or you are responsible for paying the taxes directly to the IRS. No legitimate lottery collects taxes on behalf of the IRS from lottery winners. Other times, the scammer tell the “winners” that in order to collect their prizes, they need to pay administrative fees. Often, the victims are told to send the fees back to the scammer by gift cards. Gift cards are a favorite of scammers because they are the equivalent of sending cash.
After years of declining revenues Publishers Clearing House filed for bankruptcy in April of 2025 and its assets were sold to ARB Interactive who are now operating the company as PCH Digital LLC. Publishers Clearing House is still doing sweepstakes, but now almost exclusively online rather than through the formerly familiar mailings.
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Fortunately, there is an easy way to know, when you are contacted by Publishers Clearing House by phone, email or text message informing you that you have won one of its major multi-million dollar prizes, whether you have been contacted by the real Publishers Clearing House. Publishers Clearing House only contacts major prize winners in person or by mail. They do not contact winners by phone, email or text message so if you do receive a notification of your winning one of their major multi-million dollar prizes by those means of communication you know it is a scam.
Even if the Caller ID on your phone indicates the call is from Publishers Clearing House, it is very easy for a scammer to use a technique called “spoofing” to make it appear that the call is coming from Publishers Clearing House rather than the scammer who is really making the call. Trust me, you can’t trust anyone.
In addition, no winners of the Publishers Clearinghouse sweepstakes are ever required to make a payment of any kind to claim their prize so if you are told that you have won, but are required to make any kind of payment before you can claim your prize, you can be sure that it is a scam. As for other lotteries, remember, you can’t win a lottery you haven’t entered and no legitimate lottery asks you to pay them administrative fees or taxes.
Also, as I often tell you, it is always a red flag that you are involved with a scam when you are asked to pay for anything with gift cards. Gift cards are a favorite method of payment for scammers because they are easy to convert into cash and impossible to trace.
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Scam of the day – February 21, 2026 – Smart Home Danger: The Growing Internet of Things Hacking Threat and How to Stay Safe
I have been warning you about dangers in the rapidly expanding Internet of things for more than twelve years. The Internet of Things is made up of a broad range of devices connected to the Internet including home thermostats, security systems, medical devices, refrigerators, televisions, cars and toys. Our homes have become filled with these devices including Alexa and Siri. The FBI has longed warned consumers about the dangers presented by hacking of various devices that makeup the Internet of Things.
Cybercriminals hack into your devices that are a part of the Internet of Things to enable them to enlist your devices as a part of a botnet by which they can distribute malware while maintaining their anonymity. They also can hack into your Internet of Thing devices to access your home computers or cell phones to steal information for purposes of identity theft or to implant malware on your home computers and cell phones. The risks are extreme, but there are some basic steps you can take to protect yourself.
TIPS
Most of the devices that make up the Internet of Things come with preset passwords that can easily be discovered by hackers. Change your password as soon as you set up the product. Also, set up a guest network on your router exclusively for your Internet of Things devices. This is important so that you can keep the sensitive personal information you have on your computer or cell phone from being accessible through a hacking of any of your Internet of Things devices.
Configure network firewalls to block traffic from unauthorized IP addresses and disable port forwarding. Make sure that you install the latest security patches as soon as they become available. Use encryption software for the transmission of data and find out where data is stored and what steps are taken to secure the information.
Make sure your router is secure and use its whitelisting capabilities which will prevent your device from connecting to malicious networks. Routers are a critical part of your smart home security. Make sure it will automatically download and install the latest security updates from its manufacturer. If your router is an older router that does not have this capability, you can check the manufacturer’s website regularly for the latest updates, but frankly, you are probably better served by getting a newer, more secure router. Make sure you have a unique password for each of your Internet of Things devices and use dual factor authentication whenever you can for all of these devices.
If you are not a subscriber to Scamicide.com and would like to receive daily emails with the Scam of the day, all you need to do is to go to the bottom of the initial page of http://www.scamicide.com and type in your email address in the tab that states “Sign up for this blog.”
Scam of the day – February 20, 2026 – Deed Copy Scam Resurfaces: How Homeowners Can Avoid This Misleading Fee Trap
Today’s Scam of the day is one that I have been warning you about since 2012, but lately there has been a resurgence of this scam as indicated by the number of Scamicide readers who have inquired about this scam after receiving a confusing notice. The scam begins with a call, email or snail mail letter informing you of the importance of having a copy of the deed to your home. Often these scammers will charge you $90 or more to obtain a copy of your deed for you.
Having an actual copy of your deed is not very important once it has been recorded in the local Registry of Deeds, however it is still a good record to keep. However, obtaining a copy of your deed on your own from your local Registry of Deeds is both simple and rarely costs more than a few dollars at the most. The problem with this particular scam is that technically, it may be legal in the sense that they are offering to obtain a copy of your deed for you for a fee and there is nothing illegal about that. However, the emails and letters you receive offering this service are usually confusing and misleading which is why I consider them to be a scam.
In 2018, Ohio actually passed a law requiring specific disclosures to consumers be made when a fee is requested to obtain a copy of a deed on your behalf. The disclosure must include the actual cost charged by the Registry of Deeds for a deed copy as well as prohibiting charging a fee more than four times the cost charged by the Registry of Deeds.
TIP
This is an easy scam to avoid. If you get such a call, email or letter, merely ignore it. If you want a copy of your deed, merely contact your local Registry of Deeds where you can get one for a nominal cost.
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