Britton White, a security compliance advisor with Fortified Health Security in Memphis, Tenn., said scammers are becoming increasingly sophisticated. He recently worked with a victim of credit card fraud.
“All it took was the name, cell number, credit card number, and e-mail address of the victim,” White said. “Please share so others may not fall for the same scam.”
The victim received two emails from Walmart.com and contacted Walmart to report two attempts to reset Walmart.com password. The victim forwarded the email to onlineabuse@walmart.com.
About two hours later, the victim received a call that appeared to be from Capital One. The person identified themselves as from Capitol One and the caller ID said Capital One. The caller asked if the person was attempting a $700 purchase at a Walmart in Orlando. The victim said “No.”
The caller said the card would be locked and a new one issued. The caller then stated they were adding an additional level of security to the account and were going to send a code to the phone via text and to please read the number back to caller. This is normal operating procedure. This code came from the number Capital One texts from and had the usual Capital One language. The number was read back and it was stated the new card should come in the mail in 5-7 business days.
“After the call was over, the victim was uneasy and called Capital One directly only to learn the previous call was a fraud,” White said. “No hold had been placed and additional purchase alerts through the Capital One app were pushed to the victim’s phone. After further investigation, it was determined that the fraudster had used the code provided to them to add the credit card number to Samsung Pay and then began making purchases.”
White said the legitimate Capital One fraud department was surprised by the sophistication of the fraudsters and their scam that involved spoofing their number and a request for a code to be sent.
“During the entire call the fraudster acted, spoke and took the exact steps the real Capital One fraud department would have taken,” White said. “If you get a call from a financial institution’s fraud department, HANG UP and call the number on the back of your card.”
Many people have received fraudulent calls with the caller ID showing it is from Social Security. The caller says that your Social Security account has been frozen because of fraud.
Social Security never freezes accounts, and will never make this kind of call. But the calls can be very frightening to people, especially if they depend on Social Security payments for basic expenses.
“These people are slick,” White said. “You have to be up on your game to know they are liars.”
The FCC says that unwanted calls – including illegal and spoofed robocalls – are the FCC’s top consumer complaint and the agency’s top consumer protection priority. FCC said complaints are on the rise from consumers whose numbers are being spoofed or whose calls are being mistakenly blocked or labeled as a possible scam call by a robocall blocking app or service.
The FCC said it is cracking down on illegal calls in a variety of ways:
- Issuing hundreds of millions of dollars in enforcement actions against illegal robocallers.
- Allowing phone companies to block certain types of calls that are likely to be unlawful before they even reach consumers.
- Empowering consumers to use call blocking or labeling services for calls to their telephone number.
- Working to develop ways that phone companies can authenticate caller ID to reduce illegal spoofing.
- Making complaint data available to enable better call blocking and labeling solutions.
You can file a complaint with the FCC if you believe you have received an illegal call or text.
The FCC also has the following tips to stop unwanted robocalls and avoid phone scams:
- Don’t answer calls from unknown numbers. If you answer such a call, hang up immediately.
- You may not be able to tell right away if an incoming call is spoofed. Be aware: Caller ID showing a “local” number does not necessarily mean it is a local caller.
- If you answer the phone and the caller – or a recording – asks you to hit a button to stop getting the calls, you should just hang up. Scammers often use this trick to identify potential targets.
- Do not respond to any questions, especially those that can be answered with “Yes.”
- Never give out personal information such as account numbers, Social Security numbers, mother’s maiden name, passwords or other identifying information in response to unexpected calls or if you are at all suspicious.
- If you get an inquiry from someone who says they represent a company or a government agency, hang up and call the phone number on your account statement, in the phone book, or on the company’s or government agency’s website to verify the authenticity of the request. You will usually get a written statement in the mail before you get a phone call from a legitimate source, particularly if the caller is asking for a payment.
- Use caution if you are being pressured for information immediately.
- If you have a voice mail account with your phone service, be sure to set a password for it. Some voicemail services are preset to allow access if you call in from your own phone number. A hacker could spoof your home phone number and gain access to your voice mail if you do not set a password.
- Talk to your phone company about call blocking tools they may have and check into apps that you can download to your mobile device to block unwanted calls.
- If you use robocall-blocking technology already, it often helps to let that company know which numbers are producing unwanted calls so they can help block those calls for you and others.
- To block telemarketing calls, register your number on the Do Not Call List. Legitimate telemarketers consult the list to avoid calling both landline and wireless phone numbers on the list.
- Do not answer calls from your own number, with or without your name.