My mother sent this email today. I’m posting it because although I rarely answer my phone (and never do if I don’t recognize the number), I think I may fall prey to this scam if I were more of a phone user…or friendlier - whatever.
Jury Duty Scam DO NOT DELETE WITHOUT READING !
This has been verified by the FBI (their link is also included below). Please pass this on to everyone in your email address book. It is spreading fast so be prepared should you get this call. Most of us take those summonses for jury duty seriously, but enough people skip out on their civic duty, that a new and ominous kind of fraud has surfaced.
The caller claims to be a jury coordinator. If you protest that you never received a summons for jury duty, the scammer asks you for your Social Security number and date of birth so he or she can verify the information and cancel the arrest warrant. Give out any of this information and bingo; your identity w as just stolen.
The fraud has been reported so far in 11 states, including Oklahoma, Illinois, and Colorado . This (swindle) is particularly insidious because they use intimidation over the phone to try to bully people into giving information by pretending they are with the court system. The FBI and the federal court system have issued nationwide alerts on their web sites, warning consumers about the fraud.
Check it out here: http://www.fbi.gov/page2/june06/jury_scams060206.htm
All I know is if I were a little old lady, I would totally fall for this…
Thank you for this! I would fall for it. I hate Jury duty and I would be terrified if I thought I had a warrant out. If they sound legit I wouldn’t even have thought to check where they were calling from. Oye. And I consider myself somewhat intelligent!
[...] MommaK…. and her Momma’s email. Posted by Pocklock | Tags: Daily, Scamming, Jury Duty Scam, [...]
This one was going around here in the Dallas area last month. They sometimes changed it to warrants for traffic violations. Disgusting.
People will do anything to get your information.
Beggars belief that some one would do this. I mean, scaring the crap out of someone like that… I mean, of course, you would give your information to them to stop the sky falling down but… ooo… I’m so angry that I can’t complete thoughts.
And I don’t even live in the US!
I don’t answer my phone.There’s another reason I can give, ha-ha!
Thanks for the info………I might fall for it even if I wasn’t an old lady.
Insidious. (I always wanted to use that word.)
Like jury duty isn’t bad enough….