No one — repeat, no one — needs to be so fearful that they’re stuffing tens of thousands of dollars in a box and standing at home or in a parking lot waiting for a stranger to pick up the cash in order to avoid an arrest or some other big trouble.
No one — repeat, no one — needs to listen to anyone who demands that they feed Benjamins into a bitcoin ATM at a nearby gas station or liquor store, either.
But sadly, we seem to be seeing a surge in such crimes. The storyline for the scam hasn’t changed much. What’s shocking is how brazen and bold the crime rings are getting. Some even tell victims the type and color of car to expect to pick up the cash. It’s all designed to make things seem more official.
The couriers dress up for the role and drive away with a great deal of cash, real cash, before you realize you’ve been scammed. Victims can lose their entire savings, retirement nest eggs or deplete all their investment accounts.
Scam threats remain but more demands for cash, bitcoin
“The scams aren’t really changing,” Michigan’s Northville Township Deputy Chief Matthew MacKenzie told me in a phone interview. But many criminals are changing the ways they get payments and now want money by bitcoin or cash itself.
Maybe, the scam starts when someone claims your computer has been involved in some sort of cybercrime. Maybe, you’re told you are under investigation for an alleged crime or there’s a warrant out there for your arrest.
Maybe, it’s supposedly the Internal Revenue…
