Jenkintown residents hit hard by recent online, phone scams: "Don't fall prey to these types of calls"
JENKINTOWN, Pa. (CBS) -- Jenkintown Borough Police took to Facebook to warn of online and phone scams targeting borough residents, while one woman spoke out to warn others to protect their money.
"I feel for the people," said Borough Police Chief Tom Scott.
He said this week, he took what he called a tragic report of online fraud from a member of his community.
"It looked like it was a Microsoft alert that came across their computer, gave them a phone number to call, they called the phone number," he explained. "From there, it became a continued fraud of saying they needed to pay this much money to get their computer unlocked."
Scott said, after a month, the victim lost a major amount of money.
"It ended up about $150,000 worth of fraud was taken," he said.
Scott said real agents from Microsoft will never ask for money to unlock your computer. However, that was not the only crime that happened in the borough Scott said four different types of scam reports came in over the past few days. Citizens reported getting calls from scammers pretending to work for the utility company PECO.
"What ends up happening is they try to manipulate them into thinking they owe money on a bill," Scott said.
One of those residents did not want to go on camera, but she insisted on sharing her story so others can protect their money.
"On my iPhone, it identified the caller as PECO and used a number that I am familiar with as being from PECO," one resident said.
She said the caller wanted payment information over the phone. That is something the PECO website says will never happen with a real agent. The woman said there was another red flag.
"They mentioned that they wanted to shut my power off, and I mentioned to them that you can't do that. By law, you have to send a written notice and give a certain required period of time, under the law, before that can happen," the woman said.
She did not pay any money, but she did hang up and call Jenkintown Police.
"Grateful that I was able to see the signs, and my intent in speaking with you today is simply to inform the community so that they don't fall prey to these types of calls," she said.
Scott said that was his mission, as well.
"You feel for the victims because they are being manipulated by people they feel should be trusted," he said.
So, he urged everyone to stay vigilant and don't be afraid to hang up if they think a scammer is on the line or disconnect if they suspect someone online.