Scam of the Day
Scam of the day – May 15, 2023 – FTC Shuts Down Debt Relief Scammers
Credit card debt which often carries an interest rate that is so high it could cause a nose bleed is a concern for many people and, as always, anything that concerns many people is something that scammers are interested in. Last November the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) filed a complaint and obtained a preliminary injunction shutting down ACRO Services and its related companies that the FTC claimed was operating a deceptive credit card debt relief scam in which ACRO claimed it could clean up your credit card debt in return for an enrollment fee of thousand of dollars plus additional monthly fees. Now the case has been settled and ACRO as well as other affiliated companies of their four principals have been permanently shut down.
ACRO and its affiliated companies offered nothing of value. Making matters worse, they advised their customers to stop making monthly payments to their credit card companies and to stop all communications with their credit card companies which merely led to higher credit card balances, additional credit card interest, lower credit scores and even lawsuits by the credit card companies for failure to pay in some instances.
TIPS
It is important to remember that the FTC’s Telemarketing Sales Rules specifically prohibit charging advance fees before providing any debt relief services. Any company that requires an advance fee before they have completed their successful debt reduction services is breaking the law. Never pay an upfront fee for a company providing debt relief. You also may want to consider avoiding scams like this by enrolling in the federal Do Not Call List so that if you are contacted by a telemarketer, you already know it would be someone who is knowingly breaking the law and cannot be trusted. Registering for the Do Not Call List is easy and free. Merely go to http://www.donotcall.gov to register your phone number.
If you need real credit counseling you can go to this section of the Department of Justice’s website where it lists agencies approved to assist consumers with debt problems. https://www.justice.gov/ust/list-credit-counseling-agencies-approved-pursuant-11-usc-111 You also may consider contacting companies that are affiliated with the National Foundation for Credit Counseling at this link https://www.nfcc.org/
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Scam of the day – May 14, 2023 – Sophisticated Airbnb Scam
Airbnb is a deservedly popular service that connects homeowners wishing to rent a room or their entire house with vacationers and other travelers in 190 countries around the world. I have used Airbnb many times. Unfortunately, anything popular with the public is also popular with scammers and reports are increasing about scams involving people paying scammers for renting a non-existent room or a place that the scammer does not own. Many of the victims of these scams do not find out that they have been scammed until they show up at the rental which may be far away only to learn that it is not for rent and their money is gone.
Generally, a telltale sign that the Airbnb listing is a scam occurs when the “homeowner” or “host” as they are referred to in Airbnb asks to communicate with the victim off of the Airbnb website. They also ask for the money to be wired to the scammer’s account . As I have told you many times before, once you have wired funds, they are gone forever.
However, in the last four years a more sophisticated Airbnb scam has arisen. Computer savvy criminals created a subscription service called Land Lordz which they lease to less sophisticated criminals to assist them in victimizing Airbnb customers. Land Lordz helps criminals create and manage phony listings on phony websites that look like Airbnb. The phony listings are generally copied from legitimate Airbnb listings and will include fake reviews as well. The phony Airbnb site emphasizes that all payments will go through Airbnb and will therefore be safe and secure. If someone asks for further details, which is common, the scammers email a response with a link that appears to take you to the real Airbnb website, but instead takes you to a phony website that merely appears legitimate. When the targeted victim of the scam logs into the phony Airbnb website, the scammers are notified and respond by demanding a deposit be wired to them. Once the money is wired, the funds are lost forever.
TIPS
Only communicate with hosts through the Airbnb website and use the Airbnb payment system with a credit card. Airbnb does not forward payment to the host sooner than 24 hours after the guest checks in. Never use wired funds, certified checks or any other method of payment other than a credit card through the Airbnb payment system to pay for accommodations. Always check your browser’s address bar to make sure that you are indeed on the real Airbnb website and don’t click on links to go to a website, but rather always type in the website address independently. Airbnb also provides for dual factor authentication which I urge you to use if you have an Airbnb account for greater for protection.
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Scam of the day – May 13, 2023 – Thwarting the Wrong Type of Shredder is Child’s Play
Identity theft can be high tech, low tech or no tech. As we all know, it can result from sophisticated computer hacking, but it also can come from as old fashioned a manner as pickpocketing your wallet or stealing your purse in which you may be carrying credit cards, your Social Security card or other identifying information that can be transformed into you becoming a victim of identity theft. In addition, identity thieves will also go through your trash to find material with information that can make you a victim of identity theft such as old checks, tax records, bank statements or old credit card bills. Many people do not give enough thought to their vulnerability to identity theft through these no tech methods of stealing your identity although the results can be every bit as devastating as becoming a victim of identity theft through computer malware.
Many people think that the common strip shredder which shreds your documents in long strips will protect you from identity theft. The truth is it does not. This fact was reinforced recently when North Carolina television station WFMY did an experiment with a group of fifth graders at the Northern Guilford Elementary School who were given shredded documents which they were able to piece together sufficiently to recognize account numbers and other information which in the wrong hands could lead to identity theft.
TIPS
When disposing of old or no longer needed documentation that has identifying information about you such as old bank statements, medical insurance bills, credit card bills or anything with your Social Security number on it, you should make sure that you shred these documents before disposing of them and make sure that you use a cross shredder because shredders that only shred in one direction do not provide sufficient security. One directional shredded material can be pieced together to provide an identity thief with information that can result in your becoming a victim of identity theft. For years methamphetamines addicts have done this kind of identity theft. The lesson is that everyone should use a shredder when disposing of sensitive documents and the only type of shredder to use is a cross shredder.
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Scam of the day – May 12, 2023 – Mother’s Day Scams
This upcoming Sunday is Mother’s Day and once again we must be vigilant about not falling prey to scams related to this holiday. Anything popular with the public will always be popular with scammers. Although for many of us Mother’s Day is an opportunity to show our mothers how much we love and appreciate them, for scammers it is yet another opportunity to scam people.
One common Mother’s Day scam involves an email that you get offering Mother’s Day gifts such as flowers, jewelry, shoes or clothing at tremendously discounted prices. All you need to do is to click on a link to order online. The problem is that many of these offers are indeed scams. If you click on the link, one of two things can happen and both are bad. Sometimes the link will take you to an order form where you provide your credit card information, but never get anything in return. Instead your credit card information is used to make you a victim of identity theft. Even worse is the other possibility which is by clicking on the link, you will unwittingly download a keystroke logging malware program that will steal all of the personal information stored on your computer and use that information to make you a victim of identity theft.
Be careful when making online purchases. Merely because a website offering great prices may be highly listed on Google or other search engines does not mean that it is legitimate. All it means is that the scammers know how to manipulate the positioning of their website in a Google search. Other times the scammers will merely pay for an advertisement for their website to appear at the top of a search engine search.
Even if you are dealing with a legitimate online company, make sure that your communications are encrypted when you send personal information or credit card information. The easy way to do this is to look to see if the the web address of the company changes when you go to the page to input credit card information from “http” to “https” indicating that your data is being encrypted. And of course, don’t use your debit card for retail purchases either online or in a brick and mortar store because you have less protection from fraud with a debit card than a credit card.
TIPS
It is always dangerous to buy anything online from any store or company with which you are not familiar. Check out the company with your state’s Attorney General, the Federal Trade Commission or just do a Google search to see if the company is legitimate. Even then, you are better off going directly to the company’s website rather than dealing with a company through an email that may just be a forgery of an email from a legitimate company. As always, if the offer you receive sounds too good to be true, it usually is.
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Scam of the day – May 11, 2023 – Major Healthcare Data Breach
NextGen healthcare, an electronic health record software company recently notified a million patients that their personal data had been stolen in a major data breach that apparently occurred between March 29th and April 14th of this year.. This particular data breach is extremely serious because the information stolen included names, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, and home addresses.
A letter was sent to all of the affected people recently informing them of the data breach and offering free credit monitoring for two years.
As I have reminded you many times, we are only as safe and secure as the security of the companies, government agencies and websites that have our personal information. Even if you are extremely diligent in protecting your personal information, you can be in danger of identity theft and scams if your personal information falls into the hands of hackers.
So what can you do to protect yourself from these data breaches that will be occurring?
TIPS
One important lesson is to limit the amount of personal information that you provide to companies and websites whenever possible. For example, your doctor doesn’t need your Social Security number for his or her records. This is particularly significant because health care providers are the biggest targets for data breaches.
You should make sure that you have a unique password for each of your online accounts so that if one of your passwords is compromised in a data breach, all of your accounts will not be in danger. If your information is compromised in a data breach, you should immediately change the password for that account.
If you have not already done so, set up dual factor authentication for each of you accounts where it is available. This will protect you from having those accounts stolen by someone who may have access to your password.
https://www.transunion.com/credit-freeze
https://www.experian.com/freeze/center.html
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Scam of the day – May 10, 2023 – Walmart Gift Card Refunds to Scam Victims
Scammers are big fans of gift cards because they are easy to purchase, easy to send to the scammer and impossible to trace to the scammer. It is not even necessary for the scammer to be in possession of the actual gift card to use it. Sending the gift card numbers or taking a picture on your phone and transmitting it to the scammer is sufficient for the scammer to use the gift card to buy things that can then be sold and converted into cash.
In many instances the scams involved scammers posing as large companies or government agencies such as the IRS demanding payments. It is important to remember that no legitimate company and no government agency asks for or accepts gift cards as a payment method so anytime you are asked for a payment by gift card, you can be confident it is a scam.
Large retailers such as Walmart and Target are the most common places where scammers send their victims to purchase gift cards to provide to the scammers. In 2016 Walmart began tracking the gift card balances from outside the country and developed a system to recognize fraudulent patterns involving these gift cards. Using this technology Walmart identified and froze gift card funds that would have been sent to scammers. However, Walmart did not refund the cost of the gift cards to the targeted victims of the scams. Consequently the Department of Justice filed a legal action to get those frozen gift card funds returned to the potential scam victims who purchased them. This legal action has now been settled and Walmart is returning the frozen $3,958,060.84 to their customers who purchased the gift cards with those funds. People who bought Walmart gift cards between April 1, 2016 and July 31, 2017 that were identified as going to scammers and were frozen can now apply to get their money refunded. If this applies to you, here is a link you can use to apply for your refund. https://kccsecure.com/walmartgiftcardremission/Claimant The deadline for applying for a refund is July 14, 2023.
TIPS
Gift cards are a favorite method of payment for scammers because the payments are completely anonymous and unlike credit cards where a fraudulent payment can be reversed, once a scammer obtains the numbers of a gift card, the money is gone.
Often the scammers, many of whom are perpetrating the scheme from overseas pose as the IRS, the FBI or some other government agency and pressure their victims into paying them for some non-existent debt by way of a gift card. It is important to remember that no governmental agency ever demands or accepts payment by way of gift cards.
You also should remember that even if your Caller ID indicates that the call is from the IRS or some other governmental agency, scammers using a technique called “spoofing” can manipulate your Caller ID to make it appear that the call is legitimate when it is not.
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Scam of the day – May 9, 2023 – Scams Using Car Photos
After more than ten years, it is rare that I come upon a new scam, but today is one of those days. Recently in San Diego it has been reported that scammers are taking photos of cars and then posting 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 – May 8, 2023 – “Smishing” Getting Worse
Although the name may not be as familiar as “phishing” which is the name for emails that lure you into clicking on malware infected links or providing personal information that will be used to make you a victim of identity theft, “smishing” is the name given to text messages that lure you into clicking on links or providing personal information in response to a text message from what appears to be a trusted source, such as a company with which you do business.
Smishing scams have increased in frequency over the last year. According to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) 21% of fraud reports dealt with smishing. Many smishing text messages appearing to come from Amazon, USPS, Federal Express, Cash App, Netflix and others. Like phishing emails, the purpose of a smishing text message is to either lure you into providing personal information that will be used to make you a victim of identity theft or to click on a link in the text message that will download dangerous malware.
TIPS
Among the topics of smishing text messages are free prizes, gift cards or coupons, credit card offers, student loan assistance, suspicious activity on an account of yours, or a need to update your payment information with a company with which you do business. Smishing emails that appear to come from your bank are also quite common.
As I always say, “trust me, you can’t trust anyone.” You can never be truly sure when you receive a text message seeking personal information such as your credit card number whether or not the email is a scam. The risk of clicking on a link or providing the requested information is just too high. Instead, if you think that the text message might be legitimate, you should contact the company at a telephone number that you know is legitimate and find out whether or not the text message was a scam.
As for Netflix, which has been used as a hook in many recent smishing scams, the real Netflix will never ask in an email or text message for any of your personal information so anytime you get an email or text message purportedly from Netflix asking for your credit card number, Social Security number or any other personal information, it is a scam. Here is a link to Netflix’s security page for information about staying secure in regard to your Netflix account. https://help.netflix.com/en/node/13243
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Scam of the day – May 7, 2023 – Mystery Shopper Scam Continues to Claim Victims
I have written many times over the last ten years about the mystery shopper scam because it continues to ensnare unwary victims. These scams continue to be effective and are increasing in number so it is important to remind you about them again. Mystery shoppers are people hired to shop at a particular store and report on the shopping experience for purposes of quality control. Unlike many scams, there actually are legitimate mystery shopper companies, but they never advertise or recruit through emails, text messages or letters.
The manner in which the scam generally works is that when you answer an advertisement, or respond to a letter, email or a text message to become a mystery shopper, you are sent a bank check. You deposit the check into your own account and spend some of the money on the goods that you purchase which you are allowed to keep and also are directed to keep some of the balance of the check as payment for your services. You are instructed to return the remaining funds by a wire transfer.
In a Walmart themed mystery shopper scam, the targeted victim was sent a legitimate appearing, but counterfeit check for $2,940 and told to keep $540 as payment and then go to the nearest Walmart and use the remainder of the check to buy six $400 Kroger gift cards and provide the numbers to the scammer. The scam victim was then told to keep the gift cards for their next assignment although there never is another assignment and the scammers use the numbers on the Kroger gift cards to make purchases, making the actual cards worthless. The victim of the scam loses the $2,400 used to purchase the gift cards from the victim’s own bank account when the check bounces.
TIPS
One reason why this scam fools so many people is that there really are mystery shopping jobs although the actual number is quite few and the companies that do mystery shopping do not go looking for you. A firm indication that you are involved with a scam is when you receive a check for more than what is owed you and you are asked to wire the difference back to the sender. This is the basis of many scams. Whenever you receive a check, wait for your bank to tell you that the check has fully cleared before you consider the funds as actually being in your account. Don’t rely on provisional credit which is given after a few days, but which will be rescinded once a check bounces and never accept a check for more than what is owed with the intention to send back the rest. That is always a scam. Also be wary whenever you are asked to wire funds or send gift cards because this is a common theme in many scams because it is difficult to trace and impossible to stop. Legitimate companies do not use gift cards as payments.
For more information about legitimate mystery shoppers, you can go to the website of the Mystery Shopping Professional Association https://www.mspa-americas.org/scam-alerts/
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Scam of the day – May 6, 2023 – Phony Hotel Website Scam
Booking a hotel room online for a vacation can be an easy and economical way to find a room. It can also be an easy way to be scammed. According to recent figures from the American Hotel & Lodging Association, consumers were duped into making reservations at hotel websites they thought were those of particular hotels, but actually were websites set up by scammers who victimized 15 million people last year using this scam at a cost of 1.3 billion dollars to the victims.
Merely because a website comes up high in a Google search does not mean that it is legitimate. It only means that the scammer knows how to manipulate the algorithms used by Google to get a good position in an online search. Sometimes the scam website uses the logos of well-known hotel chains although they are not connected to the hotel chain. Counterfeiting a hotel logo is simple for a scammer to do.
When you make a reservation with these scam websites, you run the risk of one of two problems. The first is that you will end up paying more than you would have at the legitimate hotel website because of hidden charges or second and worst, you may not get anything and end up having your credit card number stolen.
TIPS
So how do you recognize a phony hotel website? Go to the website https://www.whois.com/whois/ where you can input the exact URL of the website that purports to be the official hotel website and you can find out who actually owns the website.
It is also important to remember not to use your debit card for a reservation. Using a credit card will make it easier for you to dispute any charges with which you disagree as well as have any fraudulent charges removed. With a debit card, you do not get the same level of protection if you are scammed and your entire bank account tied to your debit card could be jeopardized. Finally, make sure whenever you transmit personal information such as a credit card number online that the URL is preceded by “https” rather than just “http.” The “s” means that your data is being protected by encryption while being transmitted.
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