Victim Location 27016
Type of a scam Government Grant
Received initial contact through Facebook Messenger from a close trusted friend. Gave the website to visit for Free Government. The message said that (s)he had received $60,000 in free government money and did not have to pay it back. It was a grant and was easy to do, just click on the website [email protected] I trusted this friend and clicked on the website, filled it out and sent it in. Then a few hours later, I learned that this friend had been hacked. I should have called this friend, but didn’t. At first I didn’t have any reason to doubt, then alarms went off. I received an email from [email protected] telling me that my information had been received and would be processed. I would be contacted if I was eligible for any funds. I emailed back and asked where they were located and the answer was "We work in conjunction with US Treasury Department, located at Washington". I emailed back and said Washington is in my time zone and you are not in my time zone as you are five hours ahead of me. I got no response, so I emailed back and said "You are a hoax and I will be reporting to BBB". Never head from them again. I did not lose and money as I did not give any banking information. I feel very foolish. Please be aware of this scam.
Victim Location 01562
Type of a scam Government Grant
I got a call from a man who barely spoke English, and he explained that I was approved for roughly $4,900 from the government and would not need to pay it back at all. I explained right from the start that I have had these kind of phone calls a lot which ended up being a scam, and I always needed to send money through Western Union or give out a lot of my personal information. Also, I told them once I had a company tell me the same stuff they were telling me and they did not want money, but they wanted me to go down to a store buy a pre paid card and put $200.00 on it, and once that was done I could have him on the phone and he would talk to the cashier and asked if I did in fact purchase the card for that amount and that would be it and I would get my money within a few hours. Well the man me that I did not have to give any money to them at all to get the money. He told me that I would need to use a pre paid Visa or Mastercard to have the money deposited on, but I would need to make sure that there was at least $4.00 on the card I used for my government money I was receiving. I asked what was the $4.00 for because I was told I would not have to pay any money for the free government money I was getting, and he explained it was a fee to transfer the money into my account. I told him that I knew it was a scam and I hung up on him, but he did try to call me yesterday as well but I did not answer the phone. To anyone that is reading this information be cautious of this phone numb er, and any number for a person telling you that your getting FREE money from the government. If it is too good too me true then mostly like it is, good luck to anyone out there.