Telemarketing fraud is when people call you up and act like
theyre from a professional company or agency and tell you youve won
some sort of amazing trip or prize. They ask you things like your
address and credit card information just so they could have it and
eventually rob you.
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One common type of telemarketing scam is called an advanced fee
scam. An advanced fee scam occurs when a victim receives
encouragement to advance large sums of money with the hope of
receiving a large rate of return on those initial advancements. One
such notorious scam is the Nigerian Letter scam in which the
criminal lures the victim into giving out credit card information
to help purchase travel tickets for a Nigerian prince to escape
persecution and come to America. The scam promises to give a large
percentage of the princes fortune to the victim in exchange for the
travel help. The criminal then uses the credit card information to
make unauthorized purchases and the victim never sees a dime.
Criminals also frequently use pyramid schemes over the phone. A
pyramid scheme requires the victim to pay an initial sum of money
and is promised in return to receive sums of money from a number of
different people that will exponentially increase the initial
investment. While those that join the scheme in the beginning may
profit, those at the bottom of the scheme who cannot find any
followers will receive no such return. Fraudulent telemarketers
also pose often as calling on behalf of charities. They then ask
for the victim to make a donation to the charity over the phone.
The criminal then takes the credit card information and makes
unauthorized purchases with it Overpayment telemarketing schemes
involve using the names of legitimate businesses, sending a fake
check to the victim, and telling the victim that they were overly
paid for an online sale, perhaps on a site like eBay. Then, over
the phone, the criminal asks the victim to wire back the extra
money, which the criminal then takes. The victim cannot cash the
fake check and cannot recover the wired money.
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One of the most important of these cases was publicly unveiled
15 on December 7, 1995. Dubbed Operation Senior Sentinel, it was as
novel as it was successful. Successful, because it ultimately
resulted in some 1,200 arrests and hundreds of convictions across
the nation. And novel, because for the first time, it put victims
themselves in an undercover role to help current and retired FBI
agents catch fraudsters.
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Telemarketers get your info by scamming you into saying youve
won a prize or a vacation and get your address and credit card
info. When on the phone be secure with your information. Look up
the company on the internet and ask all the hard questions to the
phone person to make sure its a legit company.