Scam of the Day
Scam of the day – July 5, 2026 – American Consumer Credit Counseling Data Breach Settlement
American Consumer Credit Counseling, Inc. (“ACCC”) a non-profit credit counseling agency suffered a data breach recently experienced a data breach on Jan. 29, 2025, in which a cybercriminal gained access to ACCC’s computer systems and acquired copies of files containing personal information including names, Social Security numbers, driver’s license numbers, financial account numbers and/or payment card information. A class action was filed alleging that ACCC was negligent in failing to implement reasonable security measures. and now that lawsuit has been settled with class members eligible to receive up to $3,500 for documented, unreimbursed losses suffered as a result of the data breach, compensation of up to $80 for lost time in addressing the data breach and 3 years of free credit monitoring. Class members who did not experience out-of-pocket losses or lost time addressing the data breach alternatively can receive a cash payment of $45. Claims must be filed prior to September 16, 2026. Here is a link to the form to file a claim if you were affected by this data breach. https://acccsettlement.com/form/claim
.TIPS
Be wary of anyone who calls you asking for personal information in regard to this or any other data breach as that is a favorite tactic of the hackers to lure you into providing personal information that can lead to your becoming a victim of identity theft. Scammers often pose as the breached company and contact victims of the data breach to convince them to provide personal information.
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Scam of the day – July 4, 2026 – You Can’t Trust Alexa for Customer Service Numbers
Alexa is tremendously helpful for so many things. If you need to know the score of last night’s baseball game, if you want to know what the weather will be today or even to turn down your thermostat. for you. And it is not just Alexa. Siri or Google Home will do the same tasks for you. However, there is one task that you should not trust Alexa and the other devices to perform. You should never ask it to call a tech support or customer service number for you.
For years I have warned you about phony tech support scams done by scammers who establish bogus tech support websites for your favorite tech companies, such as Facebook and Instagram. By manipulating the algorithms used by Google and other search engines, the scammers manage to get their bogus websites into top positions in Google and other search engine searches. Other times, the merely purchase an ad on these search engines so their phony customer service number will be at the top of any search. These phony tech support websites are used to scam you out of money or personal information which they use to make you a victim of identity theft. Scammers also use similar tactics to scam people looking for help with the repair of common household appliances, such as refrigerators and washing machines.
People looking through a search engine for a telephone number for customer service or a company’s warranty center are often taken to one of the phony websites and when they call the telephone number found in the phony website they are told that they can set up an appointment for a repair person by merely providing their name and location. Then they are often told that they need to pay a small fee which they can do by credit card or debit card for a speedy next-day expedited service call. Unfortunately, this is all a scam. No service person comes the next day, however, your credit card, or even worse, your debit card is used by the scammer. But it isn’t just people who are taken to these phony search engine listings. Alexa, Siri and Google Home are susceptible to being scammed by merely picking the top position in a search engine search and putting you in touch with a scammer.
TIPS
Don’t bother Alexa with looking up and calling tech support or customer service numbers. The best place to look for a telephone number for tech support, customer service or warranty information is on the company’s official website, on your bill or in the warranty documents that came with your appliance or device. Also, be careful when you call the real number for tech support or customer service. Clever scam artists, the only criminals we refer to as artists purchase telephone numbers that are a single digit off of the legitimate phone numbers for many companies’ tech support or customer service numbers in order to take advantage of common consumer misdials.
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Scam of the day – July 3, 2026 – Phony Geek Squad Invoice Scam Epidemic
According to the FTC the company most impersonated by scammers with phishing emails containing fake bills or fake renewals is Geek Squad. Geek Squad is a subsidiary of big box store chain Best Buy and it offers excellent tech support for electronic devices including televisions and computers. Scammers have been sending phishing emails that appear to be Geek Squad invoices. Reproduced below is one of those imposter phishing emails presently circulating. It looked like a legitimate email from Geek Squad, although the grammar was not particularly good which is one of many indications that it was a scam. These types of phishing emails are intended to lure you into contacting the scammers where you will be prompted to provide information that will lead to your becoming a victim of identity theft. This email is intended to get you to respond by calling the phone number contained in the email to dispute the bill. If you do call the number you will be prompted to provide personal information that would be used to make you a victim of identity theft.
Here is the email that is presently circulating:
Payment Processed to GEEK~SQUAD
Dear Customer,
Thank you for your order.
Please review your payment amount below, we have attached a PDF detailing your order invoice and terms of your subscription.
Contact Support +1 802 209 0705 Reach out to us anytime. We’ll be happy to help you.
——Product Details: ——
GEEK~SQUAD® Network Security – Auto Renewal 3 Years subscription
Invoice Number: GT-261994
Invoice Date: 06/10/2026
Payment Method: Online
Amount: 339.99 USD
We have charged you 339.99 USD for the next 3 Years subscription. We tried to contact you on your registered Phone number, Deduction of amount will appear on your bank account within 48 hours.
If you have any Question or Wish to cancel the Renewal, Please connect us on +1 802 209 0705
Sincerely,
© 2022 GEEK~SQUAD – All Rights Reserved
+1 802 209 0705
You’re receiving this email because you signed up for a GEEK~SQUAD account.
TIPS
Never click on links or download attachments in emails or text messages unless you have absolutely confirmed that they are legitimate and don’t call companies at telephone numbers that appear in the email such as this one. Instead, if the email appears to come from a legitimate company, you can call them at a telephone number you confirm is legitimate. In the case of Geek Squad their customer service number is actually 800-433-5778. The phone number in the email is not that of the Geek Squad and the area code is that of Hawaii. Never call the number that appears in these types of emails.
An indication that this is not legitimate and is a phishing email is the fact that nowhere in the email does your name appear.
This particular phishing email didn’t even carry the logo of Geek Squad although even it did, it would not be an indication that it is legitimate as it is quite simple to counterfeit a legitimate logo to give the email the appearance of legitimacy. AI is also being used by scammers to make their emails appear more legitimate so even if you get an email that you think might be legitimate you can’t trust it. Instead call Geek Squad’s real customer service number to learn the truth.
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Scam of the day – July 2, 2026 – Fourth of July Scams
Every season is scam season and every day provides unique opportunity for scam artists, the only criminals that we call artists, to try to scam us out of our hard earned money. Here are a few scams that you should be aware of that are related to the upcoming Fourth of July holiday.
Many scammers send out emails or text messages purportedly from the IRS or any of a number of state and federal agencies in which they require you to provide personal information under the guise of some emergency. They do this because if they can frighten you enough to act during the holiday in some instances you will be unable to confirm with the real entity as to whether the communication is legitimate because all of these entities will be closed on the Fourth of July. If you provide the requested information, it will be used against you to make you a victim of identity theft.
You also should be wary of Fourth of July electronic greeting cards that you may receive. These can be loaded with keystroke logging malware that will steal all of the information from your computer or portable device if you download the malware by clicking on the link.
Finally, be on the lookout for messages that appear on your social media such as your Facebook page with links to Fourth of July themed videos that arouse your curiosity. Again, the links contained within these messages may be loaded with keystroke logging malware.
TIPS
The IRS and many other state and federal agencies will not initiate communications with you through email so you can disregard that email from the IRS or other similar entities. It is important to be skeptical of any email or text message that you receive that requests personal information. Never provide such information or click on links in such emails unless you are absolutely sure that the request is legitimate and you can’t be sure unless you have confirmed with the person or entity that purportedly sent it that it is indeed legitimate. If you can’t confirm on the Fourth of July, let it wait until you can.
As for e cards, never click on a link to an e card unless the message specifically indicates from whom it is being sent and only then after you have confirmed with that person that they indeed did send you an e card.
Also remember that messages that you get on Facebook may appear to come from friends, but may actually be coming from scammers who have hacked your real friend’s Facebook account or cloned an account using the name of your friend. In addition, unfortunately, sometimes you actually will get videos sent to you by your real friends who are unwittingly passing on malware infected material. Trust me, you can’t trust anyone.
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Scam of the day – July 1, 2026 – Phony Inheritance Scam
The Federal Trade Commission is warning people about a scam which begins when you get a letter from a law firm informing you that they are probating an estate in which they have not been able to locate an heir, however, they then inform you that you are the heir to the million dollar estate. The letter then offers to split the value of the estate with you, some charities and their law firm. If you respond to the letter, you will be asked to provide personal and financial information including your Social Security number and to pay a fee. If this sounds vaguely familiar it is because it is just a variation of the Nigerian email scam that continues to plague the online community.
Although it may seem that the Nigerian email scam began in the era of the Internet, the origin of the scam actually goes back to 1588 when it was known as the Spanish Prisoner Scam. In those days, a letter was sent to the victim purportedly from someone on behalf of a wealthy aristocrat who was imprisoned in Spain under a false name. The identity of the nobleman was not revealed for security reasons, but the victim was asked to provide money to obtain the release of the aristocrat, who, it was promised, would reward the money-contributing scam victim with a vast reward that included, in some circumstances, the Spanish prisoner’s beautiful daughter in marriage.
In the most common versions of this scam circulating on the Internet today, you are promised great sums of money if you assist a Nigerian or someone elsewhere in his effort to transfer money out of his country. While we refer to this type of scam as the Nigerian Email Scam, not all versions of this scam have a connection to Nigeria. Common variations of the scam include the movement of embezzled funds by corrupt officials, a dying man who wants to make charitable gifts, a minor bank official trying to move the money of deceased foreigners out of his bank without the government taking it or, as in this case, abandoned funds.
In most variations of this scam, although you are told initially that you do not need to contribute anything financially to the endeavor, you soon learn that it is necessary for you to contribute increasingly large amounts of money for various reasons, such as fees, bribes, insurance or taxes before you can get anything. Of course, the victim ends up paying money to the scammer, but never receives anything in return.
TIPS
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Scam of the day – June 30, 2026 – “Kind” Can be a Dangerous Word When it Comes to Scams
The Dalai Llama has said that his religion is very simple – it is kindness. And certainly we all could use a bit more kindness in our lives, however, when the word “kindly” appears in an email or text message that you receive, it can be a tip off that you are being contacted by a scammer or identity thief based in a country other than the United States, particularly countries that were once part of the British Empire where they have adopted the use of British speech patterns. According to Tim Bajarin, the chairman of the market research company Creative Strategies in an interview with Reader’s Digest, ‘You’ll often hear it used in countries with British influence, perhaps once a colonial country, where English isn’t their mother tongue.” Nigeria, for instance, a hub of international scams was a British colony from 1900 until 1960 and the British influence is still strong there.
So when you get an email or a text message that appears to be from a governmental agency such as the IRS or a company such as Amazon that uses the word “kindly” in a communication requesting a payment, personal information or asking you to click on a link or download an attachment under any pretense, you should immediately remember BS, be skeptical.
TIPS
It is a simple matter for a scammer to use spoofing to manipulate your Caller ID and make a phone call appear to come from a legitimate source. Similarly phishing emails and text messages can also appear to be sent by legitimate sources when the source is a criminal. Therefore you should never make a payment, click on a link, download an attachment or make a payment in response to any communication unless you have absolutely confirmed that the communication was legitimate.
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Scam of the day – June 29, 2026 – Louisiana Sheriff Warns About Scammers Posing as Priests
I first warned you about this particular scam in 2017, but it has recently resurfaced in many places around the country including St. James Louisiana where the local sheriff is warning people about scammers posing as a local priest contacting parishioners and attempting to lure them into sending gift cards. Similarly, last year, parishioners of the Nativity Lutheran Church in Bend, Oregon received emails that appeared to come from their Pastor, Chris Kramer in which they were asked to buy Target gift cards and provide the numbers of the gift cards to the phony Pastor Kramer to help with a “delicate” situation. The email contained the photo of the pastor and was written in a manner that closely followed his writing style. The scammers may have been aided by AI in doing so. This wasn’t even the first time this type of scam had targeted parishioners of the church. A similar less sophisticated version of the email was done five years ago.
Generally in this scam, local church, synagogue or mosque members receive what appear to be emails from their religious leaders asking them to make contributions through gift cards and credit cards. In 2017 the scams primarily asked targeted victims to wire money to accounts and people named in the emails. The emails come from email addresses that appear at first glance to be that of the local religious leaders, but a closer inspection will disclose that it is coming from a different email provider than what their religious leader. Often, the scammers harvest information from church websites to make their phony requests appear legitimate.
TIPS
The key to protecting yourself from this scam is to first be skeptical whenever you get a request to wire money or make a payment through gift cards because once money has been wired, it is gone forever which is why it is a favorite method of payment for scammers. As for gift cards, once you provide the numbers from the gift cards, the scammers utilize the gift cards to make purchases that they quickly sell in order to get cash. No religious institution solicits gift card payments nor does the IRS which is why when someone posing as a religious institution or the IRS asks for a payment through gift cards you can be sure it is a scam. The second thing that we all should do is to always confirm the legitimacy of any request for a donation of any kind before making a payment.
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Scam of the day – June 28, 2026 – Scammers Love WhatsApp, Telegram and Signal
According to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) more scams in the United States are started on social media than on any other platform at a cost of 2 billion dollars in 2025 and that figure is undoubtedly low because many victims, often out of embarrassment, do not report being victimized. A study done by the Fin Tech company Revolut found that 60% of all scams in the UK originated on the Meta platforms Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp with investment scams being the most common form of scam. Revolut referred to social media as a “hotbed” for scams.
Social media based scams take many forms, but are often based on our trusting the people we encounter as friends on social media. Remember my motto, “trust me, you can’t trust anyone.” Scammers harvest information about you that you post on social media to learn about your identity and interests and use that information to target you with a wide variety of scams including investment scams, romance scams and sales of phony products.
One way to recognize a scam is when you start communication with someone on social media such as LinkedIn, Facebook or Instagram or even through email and they want to move your discussions to WhatsApp, Telegram or Signal which are all legitimate encrypted messaging platforms, but are favorites of scammers because they are encrypted and not monitored as well as other social media where the platforms may be using AI for scam detection.
TIPS
Don’t accept friend requests from everyone who asks to be your friend on social media and don’t trust communications on social media merely because they appear to come from your friends. Often social media accounts are hacked or cloned and the scammers, posing as your friends, leverage the trust that you have in your friends to lure you into phony investments, phony sales and romances. Further, even if a communication comes from a real friend, often people will forward scams that they have been fooled into thinking are legitimate.
Use your privacy settings to limit who can see the information you post on social media.
Remember it is good rule to never click on links that may appear on social media, text messages or emails unless you have absolutely confirmed that they are legitimate because the risk of downloading malware is too great.
As for WhatsApp, Telegram and Signal, no legitimate employer offering a job or financial advisor will switch platforms after they have made initial contact with you.
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Scam of the day – June 27, 2026 – Stolen Car Reward Scam
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. In other instances, they will use the account number and routing number to create counterfeit checks.
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 – June 26, 2026 – Porn in the Cloud Scam
People are reporting receiving calls that purport to be from Apple’s Special Investigations Unit telling them that illegal child pornography has been discovered on their cloud account. The phony investigator is sympathetic when you inform them that you never stored child pornography on the cloud or anywhere else. He tells you that most likely the child pornography was somehow planted by a hacker on your computer and it is being backed up in the cloud. In order to remedy the problem, the phony Apple investigator tells you he needs remote access to your computer in order to locate and remove the child pornography from your computer. The cost of this service can be as high as thousands of dollars which the phony investigator requests be paid through Amazon gift cards. This scam presents a double whammy. Victims of the scam not only pay the scammer for services they don’t need, but by providing remote access to their computers, they enable the scammer to install a wide variety of malware that can lead to identity theft and further scams.
TIPS
Even if your Caller ID indicates that the call is coming from Apple, your Caller ID can be manipulated easily through a technique called “spoofing” by which the scammer can make your Caller ID read whatever he or she wants it to read. One way you can be sure if you receive such a call that it is a scam is that neither Apple nor any other tech company is going to call to inform you that there is child pornography on your computer. Also, Apple does not have a Special Investigations Unit. Additionally, legitimate tech companies do not accept Amazon gift cards or any other form of gift card as payment for their services. As for enabling someone to have remote access to your computer, you should never do so unless you have absolutely confirmed that the remote access is legitimately warranted and the person to whom you are giving the remote access is also legitimate.
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