(HURON COUNTY, ON) – A Central Huron senior is out thousands of dollars after he recently fell victim to a scam that took place online and over the phone.
This scam started on November 23, 2018 when the victim received a text based message advising him that he was due to receive a $399 dollar refund from a computer product that he had purchased years before. He was then instructed to contact an out of country number to initiate the refund process. The victim had received similar emails and offers before however he had never responded until this occasion.
Upon calling the number the victim was then instructed to key in a few commands on his keyboard and upon doing so he was provided an email address to plug into his computer. Upon following these simple instructions the victim provided the scammers remote access to his computer system. From that point the scammers accessed the victim’s online banking accounts and unbeknownst to the victim the scammers shuffled $3,999 from his savings account into his chequing account. By doing so the victim was led to believe the scammers had deposited a refund into his account of $3,999.
The scammers then advised the victim that they had refunded him too much so he was instructed to purchase $3,400 worth of I-tunes gift cards from a local business and after doing so was instructed to call them back with the gift card authorization codes. The scammers even coached the victim as to what to say if he was questioned by sales staff about the high dollar value purchase of gift cards. The victim followed through with the plan and provided the gift card authorization codes to the scammers.
Less than 12 hours later the victim received another call from the scammers and they advised him due to a Black Friday” computer glitch they didn’t receive the transaction thus they instructed him to go to a different store to purchase $3