Don’t fall for these scams related to coronavirus, FBI advises
(FOX 2) - It may seem like life as we know it came to a screeching halt amid the coronavirus emergency, but cybercriminals are still hard at work.
“They're preying on the fear and anxiety that we all have. We all have it, this is not just one ethnicity or age group or anything like that,” said Steven D’Antuono, special agent in charge of the Detroit Field Office.
Ways cyber criminals are exploiting the coronavirus with scams
We talk with Steven D’Antuono, the special agent in charge of the Detroit Field Office, about common cyber scams exploiting the coronavirus right now.
The FBI sent out a warning: don’t open any emails that look suspicious.
“I actually got an email supposedly from what was supposedly PayPal – which was not PayPal – saying I had suspicious activity and click on this pdf. I didn’t click on the pdf; I deleted the email immediately.”
And watch out for emails claiming to be from the CDC or any other federal government agency.
“The U.S. government, we are not sending emails to people to gain their personal information in order to send out stimulus checks. That's not happening. So if you get an email like that, delete it; ignore it; get rid of it; don’t click on it.”
In fact, most people won’t have to do anything at all to receive their stimulus checks. You can get more information on that here from the IRS.
Another scam to watch out for is emails that promise something that sounds too good to be true.
“Fake cures and vaccines. You know, the old time of the West was the snake oil salesman. In this case, there is no cure for this right now. There is no vaccine for this.”
If you receive an email that appears suspicious the FBI wants to hear from you. You can file an online complaint online here.
“So if they're complaining, and somebody else and somebody else and somebody else is complaining about the same thing, then we’re able to aggregate this and do an analysis on it and maybe bring these people to justice.”