Pittsburgh police are warning the public about an increase in several fraud scams.
Police said the most recent scheme targeted a local business owner who was contacted by someone claiming to be from “Publisher’s Clearing House” and said the victim won a prize. The business owner sent $125,000 in cashiers checks to several addresses before calling the police when he realized he was scammed.
The “grandparents scam” is also a popular ploy in the area, police said. This is when senior citizens are contacted by a scammer who tells them their grandchild or loved one is in jail, in an accident or otherwise in some type of trouble that requires them to send money immediately.
Police said this week in the Pittsburgh area, a scammer contacted a couple and made them believe all of their accounts and investments had been compromised. They were told to download an application so the caller could “remote in” to the victim’s computer and fix the problem, but the couple realized it was a fraud call.
Pittsburgh police said the scams all have the same method of operating and often do not originate from within the country.
Police provided the following tips to avoid being cheated out of your money:
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If a phone call seems unusual or unlikely, it probably is. When in doubt, hang up immediately and call your bank or financial institution directly to a phone number provided on a bank statement or official bank website, never from an email link.
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Banks will never ask for PIN numbers or one-time access codes over the phone.
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Avoid answering or block calls from repetitive unknown, or blocked numbers.
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Don’t rely on caller ID. Sophisticated scammers can spoof phone numbers to make it look like your bank.
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Never divulge personal or private account information over the phone, email or text to unknown people.
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Don’t click on unsolicited emails or text messages where the sender is not familiar to you.
“We are more susceptible to digital and online fraud as we do more and more over text and email every day,” Pittsburgh Public Safety said.
Fraud calls, emails and text scams should be reported to 911 immediately.
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