Combating Scams
Scammers are everywhere, and if you are one of their unfortunate victims, it’s unlikely you will find any government agency to come to your rescue. Adams County Sheriff Ryan Zollman said that most scammers are in far flung countries, and there is little his department can do to help you. He said if you have lost a great deal of money, it’s possible you may get assistance from the FBI but unlikely. His advice is to never put money in a bitcoin machine, and if someone asks you to pay for something using a gift card, it is likely a scam.
An Idaho State Attorney General’s Office representative said their office does not have the authority under the Consumer Protection Act to prosecute criminal activity. The representative’s best advice was to not answer your phone, period. She said she never answers hers. But then she sounded young, and older generations are more apt to answer their phones when they ring. She also added that scammers can manipulate phones, so it appears on your caller ID that they are calling from a legitimate business, a business you may have dealings with.
Two women in Council have been scammed-one repeatedly during the past year. They both happen to be in their 70’s and both are savvy and unlikely to get scammed, but they are also more likely to answer their phones.
Danna Barnhart first received a call from Direct T.V. over a year ago. The person calling said that because she was a long-time subscriber, they would update her receiver box and give her a great monthly price that would be good for two years if she would send them a check for $250. She said the number of the caller was not the number she had listed for Direct T.V, even though her smart phone identified the caller as Direct T.V., and she asked the person on the line why this was so. He told her that his phone number was part of a specialty division. Barnhart hung up, called the number she had listed for Direct T.V. and was told they were offering no such promotion.
Barnhart has had numerous scam calls over the past year. One call identified the caller as her health insurance company and left a message stating they needed urgent information from her and instructed her to call them back. The next day she called her insurance company, using the number on her own documents, and they said they had not called her.
She has two pieces of advice. Don’t answer the call. Have a list of insurance companies, telephone companies, health insurance companies, credit card companies and whoever else you may expect to receive calls from and check the number that called with your list. If it’s on your list, then it is safe to call them back, using the number from the list you have compiled.
Another Council women found a fraudulent bill on her PayPal Account. The charge was $189, and it was for the purchase of Norton Antivirus Software, which she had not purchased. She immediately Googled PayPal, called the number that came up and was connected with a scammer. Because she thought she was talking with a PayPal representative, she gave him all the bank account information he asked her for. While she was on the phone with the scammer, he was taking money from her US Bank Account. He also asked her to buy a gift card, and she told him the local gas station did not sell gift cards. She received four or five texts from US Bank while she was on the phone with the scammer, but did not read them, for she was focused on the conversation she was having with the scammer. In the end, PayPal refunded her the money for the purchase she had not made, and US Bank helped her recover all but $191 the scammer had taken from her bank account.
The woman has since cancelled all her credit cards, her PayPal account and now only answers phone calls from numbers she recognizes, but even then, she said she has since gotten several calls from one of her local good friends, and twice those calls were from a scammer.
She said the local branch manager of US Bank was helpful in getting most of her money back.
The Social Security Administration advises the public to be aware of scammers and said when they call or text they often pretend to be from an agency or organization that you know; they say there is a problem or they promise a prize, they pressure you to act immediately, and they tell you to pay in a specific way.
They say the best way to manage a scam call or text is to remain calm, hang up or ignore the text. They added that criminals will insist that you pay in a hard-to-trace manner, such as with a gift card, prepaid debit card, cryptocurrency, wire, or money transfer or by mailing cash. Don’t do it.
They also advise consumers to be skeptical of a contact that you did not initiate.
Finally, be cautious in using Google to find a phone number. It is safer to find the number of someone you do business with from your files.
