Good Neighbours Coordinators,
I am pleased to say that a large percentage of Cambridgeshire’s No Cold Calling Zones are now led by a local resident which is fantastic news and our Good Neighbours Scheme is also proving popular with over 30 schemes now in place across Cambridgeshire. Welcome to our new coordinators and thank you all for your help. I hope these updates are proving useful to you all.
Be wary of people calling you claiming to be from The Telephone (or Mailing) Preference Service asking for payment to complete your registration. TPS/MPS is a FREE service. TPS have also been made aware of an overseas company claiming to be BT, asking for your credit card details to stop unwanted calls. This is a scam. BT advise on their website to never give out your credit card details over the phone.
Another one to watch out for… We have been made aware of a resident who had a phone call recently from a man advising that he was from the police. He claimed that following the latest terror attacks, the resident’s email had been flagged as having been involved in the attacks. The caller was very aggressive and was demanding a £350 payment to ‘stop’ the problem by logging on to her PC. He called the resident up to 10 times the following day threatening that they would go to jail if they did not make payment. The resident is elderly and lives alone and was struggling to cope with all these calls so our team have become involved to help stop these phone calls. If you hear of anything like this, please try to reassure the victim and do let us know if you think we can help.
We have also had a message from the Action Fraud team warning of a text message scam. This is known as ‘smishing’ (SMS phishing!). It enables criminals to steal a victim’s money or identity, or both, as a result of a response to a text message. Fraudsters are targeting victims via text message, purporting to be from their credit card provider, stating a transaction has been approved on their credit card. The text message further states to confirm if the transaction is genuine by replying ‘Y’ for Yes or ‘N’ for No. Do not respond to these messages (or to text ‘stop’ to a strange number to stop text messages). Through this method the fraudster would receive confirmation of the victim’s active telephone number and would be able to engage further by asking for the victim’s credit card details, CVV number (the three digits on the back of your bank card) and/or other personal information. Protect yourself:
- Always check the validity of the text message by contacting your credit card provider through the number provided at the back of the card or on the credit card/bank statement.
- Beware of cold calls purporting to be from banks and/or credit card providers.
- If the phone call from the bank seems suspicious, hang up the phone and wait for 10 minutes before calling the bank back. Again, refer to the number at the back of the card or on the bank statement in order to contact your bank.
- If you have been a victim of fraud or cyber-crime, please report it to Action Fraud at http://www.actionfraud.police.uk/ or alternatively by calling 0300 123 2040
Please take care of yourselves and (as always) if you would rather not receive these little updates please let me know.
Kind Regards,
Elaine Mountfort
Community Protection Officer
Corporate and Customer Services Directorate
Telephone: 01954 286006 or 07810153604
Email: [email protected]
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