A recent surge of toll scams across the country is the latest trick phishing scammers use in efforts to coerce unsuspecting victims into paying a fine. The scammers use tactics to frighten their targets into a transaction by threatening possible legal action if their alleged dues are not paid on time.
Awareness has been made on this issue and public acknowledgement by the FBI to ignore the message’s demands and alert others of this ongoing matter. Questions remain as to where these kinds of scams originate and how the perpetrators have the personal data of United States inhabitants.
Common phishing scams like this one often include the sender posing as a company or organization in order to gain the trust of the recipient before requesting something, typically money in return.
Independent Cybersecurity Specialist Dustin Anderson has inquired about how these scammers could be obtaining the contact information of Americans.
“It’s within the realm of possibility that a significant breach of personal data occurred, causing several million phone numbers to be leaked to foreign scammers. This leads to their collective effort en masse to deceive others. The older population is who typically receives a majority of this digital fraud.” – Dustin Anderson, Independent Cybersecurity Specialist
The goal of the scammer is to acquire credit card information from the holder to gain access to their accounts, giving them the ability to potentially wire transfer money from your account to an unrecognizable location.
Ways you can identify these scams is to review the sender’s information and unreasonable requests from the message. Oftentimes, the number of the sender comes from outside the North American +1 country code and doesn’t contain a three-digit area code or a suspicious appearing email address.
Peach Pass, the Georgia affiliate for E-ZPass, released a statement on the numerous complaints of these messages.
“The texts claim the recipient owes money for unpaid tolls and contain almost identical language. The ‘outstanding toll amount’ has been similar among the complaints reported to the IC3.” – Peach Pass Customer Alerts
Phishing scams are becoming more abundant as fraudsters are finding new ways to manipulate data and entice people into producing valuable information. Another widespread phishing scheme is the package delivery scam that claims an improper address was provided for the delivery, opening a way for more personal details to be given in the guise of a harmless request.
It is crucial to remain vigilant of scams such as these to protect sensitive information. Never provide personal or financial information to unsolicited callers or emails, as legitimate toll agencies will never ask for this information over any electronic communication.
