Moultonboro email scam alert

[Killevippen]

I received this email, which looked fishy - it is confirmed as a scam.

Dear Taxpaye


Kindly sign in securely here using your email address & password and option to receive our incoming document/ billing statement via your personal email rather than through the mail.

Please note that we no longer send document / statement through regular mail. You have 24 hours to complete these steps to avoid our service suspension.

Moultonboro confirmed it was a scam here: https://www.moultonboroughnh.gov/home/news/spam-email-alert

Stay safe!

[camp guy]

Nice "catch", you did all of us a real service with your warning. Thanks.

[tis]

It's amazing what these people (nice word) come up with.

[MeredithMan]

...a lot of these characters specifically target the elderly, under the assumption that many older folks are trusting, (i.e., not suspecting someone is trying to scam them), or that they may be in a weakened mental state.

A couple years ago, my in-laws, (in their mid 80's at the time and starting to show signs of forgetfulness and mild dementia), got the call from "their grand-daughter's lawyer", stating that she had been erroneously arrested in New York City and she was too embarrassed to call her parents to bail her out and to send 5 grand to the atty, who would handle getting her out of jail. They literally got in the car and drove to their local bank to get the money. The local banker had known them for years and when she started to ask them some probing questions, figured out pretty quickly that they were being scammed.

[Sue Doe-Nym]

...a lot of these characters specifically target the elderly, under the assumption that many older folks are trusting, (i.e., not suspecting someone is trying to scam them), or that they may be in a weakened mental state.

A couple years ago, my in-laws, (in their mid 80's at the time and starting to show signs of forgetfulness and mild dementia), got the call from "their grand-daughter's lawyer", stating that she had been erroneously arrested in New York City and she was too embarrassed to call her parents to bail her out and to send 5 grand to the atty, who would handle getting her out of jail. They literally got in the car and drove to their local bank to get the money. The local banker had known them for years and when she started to ask them some probing questions, figured out pretty quickly that they were being scammed.

I had this happen to me very recently: my grandson, teary and muffled, begging me for bail money because he had been in an accident while driving drunk. It actually sounded a bit like him….but he’s in college, has no car, and someone was trying to take granny to the cleaners. Some nasty operators out there!

[TheProfessor]

A very smart and well educated lady.

Neighbor.
Computer/email message.
Came up to me while in yard. Stated that she had won a lottery.
In Nigeria.
All they wanted was $100.00 for processing and they would send her $100,000.

She asked me if I thought that this was legitimate.

Go figure.

[tis]

I had this happen to me very recently: my grandson, teary and muffled, begging me for bail money because he had been in an accident while driving drunk. It actually sounded a bit like him….but he’s in college, has no car, and someone was trying to take granny to the cleaners. Some nasty operators out there!

We got that too, he even knew the grandson's name and state and had the accent down.

[IslandRadio]

The English/grammatical errors would be the first give-away that this was/is phishing.

[TheTimeTraveler]

A very smart and well educated lady.

Neighbor.
Computer/email message.
Came up to me while in yard. Stated that she had won a lottery.
In Nigeria.
All they wanted was $100.00 for processing and they would send her $100,000.

She asked me if I thought that this was legitimate.

Go figure.



I got the same email.

I told them to deduct their fees and send me what was left.

That was the last I ever heard from them. I wonder why?

[Riviera]

We recently lost a beloved cat. My wife posted “lost pet” notices on social media, and local web forums, including her gmail address and phone number. Two days later, she received an e-mail from somebody stating they had found our cat. My wife, in a bundle of excitement, responded right back. The scamster told her that they needed to verify her identity, and that she would just need to reply back with a 4 digit code that she would get in a verification email from Google.

She then got a verification email from Google. She sent the code back to the scamsters. At that stage, they were able to get into her gmail account, and were able to hijack her phone number using a web phone service clone of her number. I quickly figured it out, and told her to change her gmail password asap. My wife was in absolute tears.

The next day, our daughter got a text that looked like it came from my wife. The text asked for her credit card number, ss#, and bank account number in order to finalize my wife’s will. Luckily, my daughter didn’t have her ss#, and called my wife to tell her. Had my daughter not made that call, it would have been a mess.

My wife was then forced to inform all of her contacts to look out for strange text or email requests, and we had to resecure all of our accounts.

All this, after losing a family pet.

These people are despicable human beings.