Unterallgäu / Memmingen - As reported by the police, phone fraudsters are currently trying to cheat seniors in the Unterallgäu district out of money.
The police asks that you heed the warning.
Since midday the operations center of the police headquarters in Swabia South / West has recorded an increased number of reports.
The callers pretended to be police officers or pretended that the person called had won a competition.
These are scams!
So far, those called recognized the fraudulent calls and reacted just right.
They did not respond to the discussions or immediately stopped them and reported the incidents to the police.
The procedure of the "wrong police officer" or the "lucky messenger" is not new and is perfidiously used and continued by call centers fraudsters.
The police recommend the following behavioral guidelines:
Never give information about financial circumstances on the phone;
Authorities do not ask you to hand over cash.
Share these practices with family members and neighbors.
You do not receive calls from the emergency number 110.
Hang up and if you have the slightest doubt, call 110.
Do not allow yourself to be put under pressure and do not let strangers into your home.
Further explanations about the scams
False Police Officer:
The extremely professional and very eloquent callers introduce themselves as police officers or other official representatives.
Through skillful manipulation and repeated contact, sometimes lasting for days, they succeed in building a strong relationship of trust with their victims.
In order to legitimize themselves, the victim is sometimes asked to call the local police station back.
The perpetrator then pretends by playing a dial tone that the connection has been interrupted, although it still exists.
If the victim now dials the local police number or 110, no new connection will be established.
Instead, the same perpetrator or an accomplice pretends to take the call again as the "real police".
So hang up the connection and call the emergency number 110, if possible from another telephone.
Don't get connected!
The phone number shown on the called party's phone display can be manipulated by the perpetrators using software.
In the case of wrong police officers, the phone number of the local police station or the local area code is sometimes displayed in connection with 110.
The display of a known phone number is therefore no reason for false trust.
False profit promise:
“YOU HAVE WON 10,000 EUROS” - calls to citizens start again and again like this or similar.
An alleged messenger of luck from a lottery or a competition comes up and tries to make you know that you have won.
In order for the profit to be paid out, the called party must first pay fees.
This is often in the form of so-called voucher codes that can be bought at petrol stations, in shops or in discount stores.
The names and stories are interchangeable, the mesh behind them remains the same.
By skillful conversation, the fraudsters manage to make the called party believable that the main prize is waiting for them.
(MK)
