Better Business Bureau warning about fake police call spoofing scam

BESSEMER, Ala. (WBRC) - The Better Business Bureau is warning folks about another fake police call spoofing scam after another person recently fell victim, losing $2,500.

On Monday, April 17, Breanna Garrett received a call from someone claiming to be from the Department of Treasury who told her she was a victim of theft and needed to secure her funds.

During the phone call, Breanna said they then asked her to buy gifts cards.

Breanna refused and hung up saying she will dispute the matter with her bank.

Thinking she had done the right thing, a few moments later she received a call from who she though was the Bessemer Police Department because it popped up on her caller ID. They were telling her to follow their instructions and go get the gifts cards and that’s exactly what she did.

Breanna, unaware of spoof scams, went to her bank the next day. That’s when they informed her that this was a scam and they had no way to give her back the money she lost.

The Better Business Bureau says a government entity or law enforcement agency will never contact you by phone asking for money, and unfortunately, with these types of scams if you wire money to anyone, you will never get that money back.

“I have a small family I was providing for and now I have no idea what I’m going to do so I want to make sure that the people of society are aware of this scam,” said Breanna Garrett.

“The more you know the better, you need to be able to identify the red flags, you can then do the scenic route to track down and figure out if anyone from this entity is actually attempting to contact you for legitimate businesses purposes,” said Garet Smitherman with the BBB.

If you have encountered or fallen victim to these types of scams, head over to the BBB’s scam tracker tool to report it at BBB.org/scamtracker.

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