Lose money due to fraud? You could again through a recovery scam.

You got scammed. To warn others or share your misery, you post online how your money was stolen. A person steps forward in the comments to offer to help. They’re probably not being kind; they’re part of a criminal organization that wants to steal your money, identity, or both.

The Federal Trade Commission estimates that U.S. citizens were scammed out of $10 billion in 2023. NordVPN, an online security company, says the criminals feigned being a relative in distress, a technical support expert, a government or bank representative, or an employee of a well-known business. Their thievery produced many victims who hoped—realistically or not—that they could somehow retrieve some or all of their money.

Enter the recovery scammers.

Aura, a digital security firm, says the perpetrators deceive people who lost money or another possession by offering:

• Cryptocurrency recovery
• Stolen-vehicle recovery
• Recovery services on social media
• Investment fraud recovery
• Amazon over-refunds
• Tech-support overpayments
• Business overpayments

You can read about how each works on the company’s blog post. Visit Tropical Financial Credit Union’s webpage to learn more.

How do you protect yourself? The good news is that the Federal Trade Commission, Commodities Futures Trading Commission, FINRA and online security firms have web pages devoted to spotting recovery fraud and protecting yourself from harm.

Their guidance can be summed up this way:

First, the fraudsters already know who you are. In the internet's dark corners, they purchased or traded for a list of victims. They may even be the people who initially committed the fraud and are coming back for a second helping under the guise of assisting you.

Criminals contact you via email or phone, claiming to be from an official source such as a government regulator, a law firm or a consumer-help group. They may also claim to be fraud-recovery investigators. Do a Google search on them, and you’ll find false information, advertising and five-star consumer reviews.

You may be directed to a professional-looking website to fill out a claim form or report. That’s part of their scheme to obtain your personal information, something you should never share.

Once you ask for assistance, they request an advance payment that serves as a retainer, a donation to the nonprofit helping you, or owed taxes. None of this is true. Your money will be gone – again – and you will receive no services and never receive a response to your emails and calls.

Until they get your money, the scammers use various techniques to stay in touch. For example, they may call saying they may have recovered your car and need your driver’s license and license plate information to confirm that the vehicle is yours.

They ask you to send the difference for supposed overpayments and over-refunds. The best practice is to ask your financial institution to investigate whether the check or other deposit is legitimate. This will foil the scammers’ plan to have you send them money before you discover the check or wire transfer from them bounced.

Last, they ask for bank account information or access to your computer to expedite the return of your lost funds. Both will likely be used to withdraw funds without your permission.

Here are other ways to protect yourself:

• Be wary if the person contacting you already knows a lot about your loss. A legitimate organization will not possess the details. Ask the person how they obtained the information and weigh the response against what you have kept private.
• Check email addresses. A legitimate representative of an organization will have a professional address, not a Gmail or Yahoo account. Remember that some sophisticated fraudsters can “spoof” or fake email addresses.
• Be suspicious when your contact asks for a lot of personal information upfront, such as your email address, phone number, address and so on. They may be engaged in identity theft.
• Do not share bank information such as your account numbers, online account login ID and password or the PIN on your debit card. No one from Tropical Financial Credit Union will ask you for that information via phone or email.
• Pay attention to details. Does the organization the person claims to represent have a legitimate address? Search online for a map of the location. Conduct a reverse search of the phone number to see to whom the number is registered. Search the organization name in the online corporate registry of the state where it claims to be registered. Where you find a record, check the names of the corporate officers; they may be fake.

Remember if you think your bank information has been compromised in any way, be sure to contact Tropical Financial and we will help you put safeguards in place.