This is a very scary scam, but it is a scam. You get a phone call from someone who sounds like a family member. They tell you something like I am in some foreign country or distant state and have been arrested and need money. Or I was in a car accident and am in the hospital (maybe via a text).
The bottom line is:
- Create fear
- Create urgency
- Need money
- Send it now
Here is a reason example, ripped from the news:
I am not going to say this is never true, but the odds are very low.
More than likely, someone found enough video online from a family member that they could train an AI with it and you can make it sound like anyone – such as one of your kids.
If you have a way to do this, message the supposed “victim” privately while you are still talking and verify they are okay. If you can’t do that, make up some excuse and hang up and then contact the supposed victim.
By the way, the supposed victim may hand you off to a “police officer” or “doctor”. That person is the closer and will do damn near anything to close the deal. Knowing that going in helps. If you have to, just hang up. They will call back, but it may give you a minute to think.
I have seen this scam happen when the supposed injured person is sitting right next to the person who is being scammed. Needless to say, that scam didn’t work.
You can report this to the local police or the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (www.ic3.gov), but don’t expect either of them to come to your rescue; doing that will give the cops more information about the different scam techniques, frequency, etc.
Unless the scammers are really stupid (and that does happen occasionally), finding them is hard and prosecuting them, likely in a foreign country, is even harder.
So, the best way to handle this is a good defense. In this case, knowledge.