At some point in your life, you’ve probably received a call where the name and/or number that showed up on caller ID was not the actual name/number of the caller. It’s known as spoofing, and many people assume it’s illegal. Those people would be wrong. [More]
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Scammer Uses Counterfeit Cash To Buy Motorcycle, Calls Victim To Warn Against Using Bogus Bills
By 6.20.13
Most people who end up with a wad of counterfeit cash don’t find out until they take it to the bank or try to use it at a store that checks for funny money, but a woman in the St. Louis area says the man who bought her husband’s motorcycle using bogus bills later called to let them know they’d been had. [More]
Jersey Shore Landlord Caught Renting Out Uninhabitable Properties And Homes He Doesn’t Own
By 6.6.13
The New Jersey coastline can be a goldmine for owners of rental properties, as vacationers flock to the Atlantic Ocean every summer looking to rent for anything from a few days to the entire season. But one landlord is accused of bilking dozens of renters by taking their money for homes not fit for human habitation, some of which he doesn’t even own anymore. [More]
Banker Accused Of Stealing $2 Million From Elderly Customers — At Two Different Banks
By 5.29.13
Remember that Wells Fargo employee charged with defrauding a 90-year-old customer out of $10,000? That’s amateur hour compared to the Oakland woman accused of not only stealing around $2 million from bank customers — but doing it at two different banks. [More]
New York Warns Of Medical-Alert Device Robocalling Scam Targeting Seniors
By 5.23.13
Most of you know to be suspicious when someone calls out of the blue to tell you you’ve been approved to get something for free. But not everyone is as savvy as y’all, which is what scammers depend on to make their money. [More]
NY Shuts Down Sham Fundraising Company That Took In Millions Of Donations For Breast Cancer “Research”
By 5.3.13
Between 2005 and 2011, the Coalition Against Breast Cancer raised around $10 million in donations intended for research to combat the disease, but authorities say that no such research ever occurred, and all that money went to pay for a grand total of 40 mammograms in seven years. [More]
No, You Did Not Randomly Win A Vacation From Travelocity
By 4.25.13 — Updated: 9.5.14
Remember when we told you about the scammers out to trick people into thinking they’d won travel vouchers from the nonexistent (at least in the U.S.) United Airways? Since then we’ve heard of two apparently separate-but-similar scams using the Travelocity name to deceive unsuspecting consumers. [More]
Bogus Weight-Loss Products, Fraudulent Prizes Top List Of Biggest Scams
By 4.19.13
More than 1-in-10 American adults fall victim to some sort of fraud, according to a new report from the Federal Trade Commission. And scams related to fraudulent weight-loss products are by far the most prevalent. [More]
No, You Didn’t Earn Two Free Travel Vouchers From ‘United Airways’
By 4.11.13 — Updated: 9.5.14
For at least the last year, something calling itself ‘United Airways’ — which is the name of a regional carrier in Asia that has nothing to do with this story — has been sending out versions of the above letter to consumers, promising free reward travel, but both the airline industry and the Better Business Bureau say it’s nothing but a scam. [More]
Feds Shut Down Telemarketing Scam Aimed At Elderly
By 3.11.13
It’s bad enough to call up an elderly person and mislead him or her into paying a pile of cash for a medical alert service they don’t need or want. But what takes one Brooklyn-based telemarketing scheme to the next level was its alleged tendency to bill consumers thousands of dollars for something they never ordered. [More]
Walmart Worker Stops Woman From Wiring $2,100 To Fake Stranded Grandson
By 3.7.13
With all the news of scammers out there stealing money from unsuspecting folks using the lowdown, dirty “Help, I’m your grandson/niece/other close family relative!” act, our hearts are warmed all the more when observant customer associates stop those scams cold. Here to brighten the day comes the tale of the Walmart employee and the loving grandma. [More]
5 Warning Signs That A Craigslist Rental Listing Is Probably A Scam
By 2.27.13 — Updated: 12.6.16
Even though it’s nothing new, we’ve recently started seeing a resurgence of reader e-mails asking if a really awesome-sounding rental listing on Craigslist might be a scam, so we figured it was time for a refresher course. [More]
Scammers Find New Favorite Target: Lawyers
By 8.6.12
Lest you think that the only people being taken in by apparently obvious scams are naive rubes, it looks like lots of people with fancy law degrees are being scammed by letting their avarice get the better of them. [More]
FTC Warns Against Scammers Pretending To Be From The FTC
By 8.3.12
While the Federal Trade Commission is working to protect American consumers from scam artists, badvertisers, robocallers, and other unseemly types, the agency is not handing out $250,000 sweepstakes prizes. [More]
Thousands Of NJ Residents Don’t Realize They Were Scammed, Pass Scam On To Family & Friends
By 7.23.12
We recently told you about scammers tricking consumers into sharing sensitive information by telling them a federal stimulus plan will pay their power bill for a month; they just need your SSN and bank routing number. If you think that no one would fall for such an obvious ruse, then you might be surprised to know that not only were thousands of people in New Jersey taken in by the scam, but they passed it along to their friends because they thought it was a good deal. [More]
FTC Warns About Scam Tied To Affordable Care Act
By 7.13.12
It’s barely been two weeks since the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the most controversial portion of the Affordable Care Act, and scammers have already been busy on the phone trying to steal folks’ money by pretending they work for the government and need your sensitive, personal information. [More]
No, Microsoft Techs Are Not Proactively Calling You About Your Error Messages
By 5.22.12
Software crashes. And sometimes when it does, you get the option of sending an error report to the developer. You’ll never hear back, because that’s not the purpose of the report. But that hasn’t stopped scammers from pretending they are Microsoft techs responding to your crash reports. [More]
Company Behind Billions Of Phony "Auto Warranty" Robocalls Shut Down By FTC
By 3.28.12
Have you ever answered a call from an unfamiliar number only to hear a recording tell you there is important information about your automobile warranty? You’re not alone, as the folks at the FTC have shut down an operation it says was responsible for billions of instances of deceptive dialing. [More]
