The FBI is warning locals of a new scam in which criminals pose as government officials with the FBI.
Amanda Videll with the FBI in Jacksonville says a Florida woman got a call from a scammer claiming to be with a sweepstakes company; she did the right thing and hung up, Videll says, but then received another call hours later.
“She received a call from someone who said they were working for the FBI and conducting an investigation into a sweepstakes company and asking for her personal information to be helpful in the investigation so of course for a moment she thought, ‘yes I can help catch these bad guys,’ she almost provided that information, but realized that that wasn’t going to be a good idea,” Videll explained, adding that the scammer threatened the woman.
“The problem with these types of scams and the reason they work is that these scammers are targeting people who want to do good... They want to help society as a whole and they want to help law enforcement in our investigations, so it causes people to think twice about this.”
Videll says scammers prey upon people who want to do the right thing.
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Multiple versions of the government impersonation scam have been reported in recent days, the FBI says. Videll says scammers are getting smarter.
“Lately the FBI has been asking the public to help us in our investigations and very vocally doing so across the country, so it makes to a lot of people for the FBI to be asking them to participate.”
She says scammers are becoming harder to track partly because so many of their calls go unreported. Videll says the best way to help the FBI track down scammers is to report the calls.
“These types of investigations are not easy but with the public’s help in telling us information like this it certainly makes it a lot easier.”
You can report scams here at the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center, you can click HERE to access the website.
The FBI wants people to remember -- scammers use intimidation tactics like threatening jail time or fines if they don’t comply. The FBI says it would never threaten or demand money in any investigation.