City of Owosso Government issued the following announcement on Oct. 20.
Online scammers are out there, impersonating the authorities and conjuring up different schemes to fool our residents into giving them money. There have been several calls impersonating the Owosso Police!
You get a phone call. Someone you care about is in jail and, they say, you need to pay up to bail him out. The scam-detecting radar in your head immediately goes off. You’re skeptical – but the caller ID says the call is from the police department.
The caller tells you to put money on a prepaid card and give him the card number. Now your scam-detecting radar is going off the charts. You know that police departments — and the federal government, for that matter — don’t tell people to pay with prepaid cards. You also know using a prepaid card is like paying cash — once the money is gone, you can’t get it back.
“But what about the caller ID?” you wonder. In fact, what seems like reliable information about the source of a call isn’t so reliable anymore. Scammers can rig caller ID to look like they’re calling from the police department. The police will never ask you for a prepaid card to bail someone out of jail.
If you receive one of these calls, hang up immediately. Report the imposter to the FTC at ftc.gov/complaint. Select the category "Scams and Rip-offs" then "Imposter Scams".
Original source can be found here.
Source: City of Owosso Government
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