The email came with an ominous subject line: “Scams are evolving. Identify them and shut them down.” The message started with an all-too-common story, “A 76-year-old retired lawyer lost his entire life savings after trusting a ‘federal investigator’ on the phone.”
The sender was a consumer financial services firm with over $1 trillion under management. The company warned of three common scams: imposter, romance, and call center. The first type fooled the former attorney. You could be a victim of any of them.
How do you protect yourself from having your bank account drained or your credit card information used to run up thousands of dollars in purchases?
Be very, very skeptical online. This summer, Amazon is warning its members of fake emails claiming their Amazon Prime subscription will automatically renew at an unexpected price. Because information obtained elsewhere about the member appears in the message, it seems legitimate. The recipient is then tricked into visiting a website or pressing a "cancel subscription" button that leads to an authentic-looking login page.
Were you searching online for a bank or card issuer? One financial institution is warning its customers that scammers list fraudulent versions of its website in search results, particularly sponsored ads. The site looks authentic, but it’s designed to take your money.
What should you do? Don’t click any links. Besides being defrauded, your computer could become infected with malware that allows criminals to steal more passwords and private information, thus accessing other accounts and impersonating you for purchases and new accounts.
Amazon recommends using its app or visiting Amazon.com to check your membership status and expiration date. The financial institution recommends typing its web address (Tropical Financial Credit Union’s URL is tropicalfcu.com) and bookmarking it for future reference.
Don’t answer the phone. Scammers can now insert an official name, such as the IRS, into the caller ID. Some crooks fake the phone number, too.
Tropical Financial and other institutions will never call and ask you to share sensitive personal information like your account or card number, Social Security Number, PIN, or online banking credentials. Nor will we ask you to move or send money. If you receive such a call, hang up immediately and dial the credit union (Our number is (888-261-8328) or the credit card issuer (The number is usually on the back of the card.)
Be prepared. Tropical Financial devotes part of its website to theft protection and credit monitoring. Starting on this webpage, you can learn about:
- Instascams, a fake security alert sent via a DM.
- Tactics such as Phishing, Vishing, Smishing and Pharming.
- Prevention, from basics such as “Sign off, shut down, disconnect” to setting up an automatic timeout from an account.
- Reporting fraud so that you can immediately halt a problem.
- Safety for your ATM or debit card, including monitoring its activity.
