Scam artists keep getting more sophisticated, and the sheer number of them and the amount of money they’ve taken continues to spike compared to a year ago. That has Prince George’s County police reminding people about what to watch for, while revealing more about how scammers target victims.
In June, a county resident called police embarrassed to admit she had fallen prey to what’s considered a tech scam. Malware on her computer popped up and told her to call a number because of a virus.
“The victim called the number and was then connected with three separate individuals who all identified themselves to be working on the victim’s behalf,” said Lt. Joseph Bellino, who leads the police department’s financial crimes division. “First was the tech support scammer, who advised her that he was working to resolve her computer (issues) and requested to remote access into her device.”
A lot of the time, that malware is in the form of a “pop-up” ad that gives you a number to call, but sometimes it can be embedded in an ad on whatever search engine you use. Police have concerns about how well the links in those ads are vetted by companies that run the search engines.
“When they ask to remote into your device, what we believe they’re doing is looking at the browsing history of the victim,” said Bellino. “And from that, they’re able to determine the banking institution just from looking at the browsing history. They then bring that information forward, as if it was information that only somebody who knows them would have known, and the victims don’t realize that they’re viewing their browsing history.”
Bellino said that gives the scammers legitimacy in the eyes of the victim.
Last month, the scammers then posed as officials with the Social Security Administration, using official letterhead to email a letter as an attachment, since the victim was around the age where they would begin receiving Social Security.
Bellino said the language in the letter was grammatically weak, as if it was written by someone in a foreign country. But he worries that the use of artificial intelligence will make those letters even more believable in the coming months, while also helping scam artists better disguise their voices.
In this case, the victim was led to believe her bank account had been hacked and her bank and the federal government were working to limit the damage. She withdrew a large amount of money from her account, thinking she was acting before bad guys on the dark web could steal from her.
But the man who showed up to help her wasn’t a representative from the bank, and he wasn’t there to help.
Video shows a man giving her a code word, which had been provided by people she had spoken with on the phone before. Police are hoping someone can help identify him.
Between January and August of last year, 13 similar tech scams were reported to police — the financial losses of which totaled $287,000. So far this year, more than 20 such scams have resulted in almost double the amount of losses.
“Scams of this nature do not get reported to law enforcement; many times, because the victims feel ashamed for the loss and how the crime is perpetrated,” Bellino said. “We urge members of the public, if they have been victimized by tech support scams, please come forward.”
How are victims found?
Inadvertently or not, you can make yourself visible to scammers by clicking on malware. But with all the calls, text messages and emails you get from these scammers every day, the reality is there’s a huge list of potential victims, and your name is probably on it.
“Information is sold on the dark web,” Bellino said. “From what we see, some of our victims are middle aged and younger, but many of them are older adults, who are more prone to respond and answer (to these scams).”
“When they’re making a phone call, they have information on their end of who they’re contacting, potentially who their relatives could be, an idea of maybe the value of their home,” Bellino added. “You have to believe that all this information is out there. And so, when they’re making contact with their victims, they already are holding information that the victim thinks may be private.”
Once scammers get a response from you, Bellino described it as “psychological warfare” and the goal is to always keep you in fear about what could happen. The easiest way to not become a victim is to not answer the phone if you don’t recognize a phone number, whether it comes in the form of a call or a text message. Likewise, never call a number on a pop-up ad.
“It’s difficult as the population ages and the mental capacities of older adults diminishes on all of us,” Bellino said. “We see that the targeting by these criminal groups is only going to increase.”
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