A popular phone call/voicemail scam (i.e., vishing) involves someone calling you, claiming to be law enforcement with a warrant for your arrest, and then offers you an opportunity to avoid arrest by paying the “fine.”
Anyone can be scammed. It just takes the right scam at the right time.
And these fake law enforcement scams work all the time. Sometimes they are calling to say you missed jury duty. Sometimes the reason is supposedly that you cheated on your taxes. Sometimes it is for unpaid speeding tickets or something else. The scammers are working on the basis of a few facts. One, that everyone, even those working within the legal sector, innately, honest or not, fears law enforcement. Some more than others. Second, a large percentage of people called by someone claiming to be law enforcement are going to believe it is actually law enforcement. Third, most people have done something seen as illegal, but not usually enforced (e.g., skipping jury duty, speeding, cheating on their taxes, etc.).
It is the perfect scamming scenario that is likely to work across a large percentage of any population they call.
And the scammers are stepping up their game. The calls are pretty realistic. I was reminded of this recently when a friend was relating a vishing attempt against her in a phish-sharing forum. She is a long-time cybersecurity industry professional, actively involved in the human risk management (HRM) industry, and someone tough and savvy enough that you would not want to scam her if you knew her. She does not play around.
Well, she got an unrecognized call, and unlike her normal treatment of such things, decided to answer it.
She was immediately met with someone claiming to be with local law enforcement. They had the county right, her name right, but her old address. My friend was immediately suspicious. They then claimed that she had been summoned to appear at a court case, had failed to appear, and now a warrant had been issued for her arrest. She was even more suspicious and pretty certain this was a scam.
Of course, they wanted money. Supposedly, she had to pay a bond and if she did not pay it, she would be immediately arrested if she went on any government property. She thinks this is a scare tactic to not only make the victim think they could be randomly arrested in the future if they do not pay, but also to prevent them from going to law enforcement to seek clarification.
The scammers stated that she was under a federal order not to talk to anyone. That is an isolation technique. She shared that she was discussing it with her husband and had them on mute. The attackers claimed they had special monitoring software that could confirm if they were on mute or talking to other people, and that was not allowed.
She said the caller sounded like a native English-speaker with a southern dialect, which was strange because she lives in the Northwest.
They gave her the court case number. My friend immediately looked it up, and it did come to an active court case on the county’s court website. Whoever was calling took enough time to research public records to get that information. My friend, again, was suspicious the whole time. She heard what sounded like an official law enforcement background noise. She felt the caller and background noise seemed a bit over the top, with too many 10-4s and other similar police jargon.
At this point in time, she was pretty sure it was a scam call. But at the same time, she had been travelling more than usual for work, and there was a very tiny chance the caller was legitimate. Some of the phone numbers they gave her were the right numbers for local law enforcement.
So, she decided she would go up to the local law enforcement station, not too far from her house, and ask about the warrant and claim. And not surprisingly, when she did, they had no record of a warrant taken out in her name. They assured her that had a warrant for her arrest been taken out in her name, they would not call her or offer to let her pay a fine.
But the real kicker that confirmed she was dealing with scammers was when she asked the callers how she could pay the fine and they told her to go get Walmart gift cards. Yep, you read that right. And as we all laugh that supposed law enforcement is asking us to pay a legal fine using Walmart gift cards, it must work on a non-minor percentage of people, or the scammers would not use that method.
When she was on the way to law enforcement, she told the scammers she was on her way to Walmart. They sent her this text message with instructions on how to get the money put on the gift cards (see below).
At that point, my friend laughed, told the scammers on the phone that she was at the local law enforcement office, and asked if the scammers would like to talk to them to figure out the discrepancy.
Crickets! Then a click.
My friend shared this story with others because their ability to sound official, use real case numbers, have information about her, and even have official-sounding background noises made her hesitate and not just immediately hang up. She was both surprised and impressed by their scamming skills and could see how people could fall for it.
The anti-phishing group was surprised to hear that the scammers had what seemed like native language skills because so often these scams are perpetrated from other countries. That is still true, but today’s AI lets anyone talk in any language in near real-time. They can turn a non-native speaker with a heavy accent into a native speaker with a local accent. We were not sure if that was what was happening here, though.
Vishing scams are huge and likely to get bigger and bigger because of AI deepfakes. Be aware that these are often elaborate scams, well-researched using publicly available records, using professional call centers, trained scammers, and lots of little details that are subconsciously going to make you override your initial suspicions.
I have had friends call into what they thought was AT&T to receive a hot discount from a new promotion they were running, only to hear what sounded like an AT&T official call center. It had professional-sounding operators, background commercials with famous people’s voices promoting the new discount deal, and even the ability to pay off their current bill. They pay off the victim’s current bill with a stolen credit card and ask the victim to go to the real AT&T website to confirm that the bill is paid, which they see and confirm. At that point, the victim really thinks they are talking to AT&T. Except they are not.
Let your family, friends, and co-workers know that today’s scammers are professional, well-funded, well-researched on the victim in particular, and sound a lot more like the legitimate brand being impersonated than you would expect if you have not been tested. The police, IRS, or whoever is not going to ask for money over the phone and certainly will not ask for it in the form of Walmart gift cards.
It cannot hurt to report the scam to the FTC. While they likely will not help you get back any money if you lost some, it helps to track down the phone number and services the scammers use.
Today’s scammers are not the scammers of five years ago. Verify that what you are being told is true by using an alternative, known and legitimate method. It is important to remain vigilant and if you suspect it is a scam, trust your instincts.
