
The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) on Tuesday has issued a warning about a spike in its phone number being used for Social Security fraud.
Scammers have always used services that spoof the real phone number of a government agency or service to show them on the recipient's caller ID.
With the right social engineering skills, fraudsters can easily trick a victim into sending them money in various forms. Most of the time, the payment is not via a normal channel, which is an opportunity for the victim to catch on the scam.
Simple scam, big money
The Bureau says that recently it has seen an increase in calls that fake the number of its headquarters, 202-324-3000.
To make the interaction appear legitimate, the fraudsters provide a name and a badge number, both of which are fake.
"In this scam, fraudulent callers posing as an FBI agent inform the victim that their Social Security number [SSN] has been suspended" - Federal Bureau of Investigation
Then they tell the victim that their SSN can be reactivated if they made a payment. Gift cards are a payment mechanism preferred by the scammers since all they need from the victim is a code.
They can use the code to purchase goods or to fund a bank account. After they get the code, the fraudster simply hangs up.
The FBI warns that no legitimate law enforcement officer will ask for cash or gift cards from a citizen. This type of scam is defined "as government impersonation fraud" because the crooks pose as government officials to get money from victims.
Last year, the Internet Crime Complaint Center received reports of government impersonation scams from almost 14,000 individuals. The losses amounted to over $124 million.
"The criminals often threaten to extort victims with physical or financial harm to obtain personally identifiable information. Scammers are becoming more sophisticated and organized in their approach, are technologically savvy, and often target young persons and the elderly."
Avoiding this kind of scams is easy: keep to yourself the information that can identify you as well as banking information and the SSN; don't send money or gift card codes over the phone to individuals you don't personally know, no matter how persuasive they may be.
Comments
SuperSapien64 - 3 days ago
I believe I got one these calls about a year ago but I didn't answer it, but I did look up the number and it was a law enforcement number I'm pretty sure it was suppose to be the FBI I can''t remember if they left a voice mail or not.