Thieves posing as police officers have a new way of getting people’s money.
The scam, with a high-tech twist, aims both at people’s smartphones and sense of charity.
They’re disguised as phone calls from local law enforcement, complete with phone numbers that look like the real deal.
But, they’re not.
“If you in fact get a phone call soliciting funds, don't do it,” Mike Leninger, law enforcement analyst, said.
County agencies, city departments, even university police forces from all over the Bay Area say they're being spoofed by scammers.
Some agencies are even taking to Instagram to warn people to avoid the calls.
Local
"They're appealing to your sense of love and respect for first responders,” Leninger said. “Innately, you want to help those folks, and you can. Just not through that phone call."
And they're often effective, using data collection to make it seem like they're calling from actual police numbers.
Get a weekly recap of the latest San Francisco Bay Area housing news. >Sign up for NBC Bay Area’s Housing Deconstructed newsletter.
"But the more information they have about the folks they're impersonating, the more likely the impersonation is to succeed," Alex Quilici, CEO of Youmail said
But they’re warning people not to fall for it.
"The bad guys are marketers, but they're selling a bad product,” Quilici said. “They're using marketing for a bad purpose. Whatever marketing tactics work in general they're gonna try to apply."
The number one piece of advice both officers and cyber security executives have is, don't answer the call if it's not a familiar number.
If you do answer, don't give out any personal information, and be very wary as soon as the conversation turns to your money.
