Phone Scam To Look Out For that Fooled My Friend For 30 Minutes

We all get bombarded daily with email and phone scams. It would help if we were prepared for scam attempts because you never know when they’re going to strike when you’re not ready. I wanted to share an elaborate phone scam that a friend of mine was recently targeted with and shared with me. What makes it even more interesting is that she works in the cyber-security field, and she still fell for it. The phone scammer told her that he was from the Office of Homeland Security and fed her an elaborate tale about fake driver’s licenses in her name, and suspicious packages with drugs that were confiscated in Florida addressed to her home address.  This scammer had my friend write down his name, badge number, case number, and return phone number. He even mentioned the local Sheriff’s office by name and said they would be following up in a few days. Then he questioned her about every address she ever lived, and every bank she had ever been associated with. Fortunately, she never gave out any personal identifying information, but she did confirm his information and said that she “probably added too much color about my life and it’s going to bother me for a long time.” Related: House Painting Scam Making Its Rounds This phone scam strung her along for almost half an hour. She was a bit suspicious from the start because as they went along, it just didn’t seem to be the way Homeland Security would handle an investigational interview. The scammer's accent might have been a clue but thought that a lot of legitimate businesses contract outside the country or have staff with accents. Phone Scam Ended With Red Flag The final straw for her was when he insisted she make a decision over the phone as to whether she planned to defend herself in court against charges of drug smuggling, even though he had not provided any evidence she was connected in any way. He then threatened her with up to 9 years in prison for each criminal infraction he cited by code number and reminded her the call was being recorded, to sound extra legitimate. She still doesn’t know what the actual scam was because they didn’t get that far.  She tried to find a chatbot or phone number on the FBI’s website while he was still on the line and she ended up calling 911.  That was all a waste of time. There was nothing they could do or advise her to do, other than hang up and tell her that they’d heard about this specific scam before. In the meantime, the scammer hung up. She is really upset because the scammer has her phone number, knows where she lives, and has lived over the past thirty years. He also knows every bank she’s had an account with for the last three decades. The scammer confirmed all that information and knows that she’s new here and doesn’t know many people in the area. All she can do is watch my bank and credit card statements closely. Making things worse, in the days following the incident she started receiving an increased amount of email and phone scam attempts. It’s scary so we all need to always be cautious.