#3 Lotteries
If it sounds too good to be true, it most definitely is! And these people end up trying to convince you to give them all your information by telling you that you are the “lucky” winner of some lottery or sweepstakes, most of the time posing as legitimate sweepstakes names such as Publishers Clearing House. However, if you are notified by email, phone, or mail that you are the winner of quite an impressive sum of money, at times with a realistic check attached, you need to keep an eye out for a few key details.
Actual contest businesses will never ask you to pay any fee or for you to give them any financial or personal information in order to claim your prize. This is never a requirement, and if someone tells you that the rules have changed, it’s just a ploy to scam you out of your savings. Not to mention, if the prize is under $10,000, they will send you a notification through overnight delivery, such as FedEx and UPS!
And you will also know that you entered one. There are no such things as surprise lotteries.
#4 Family Emergency
If a random number calls you and says someone you love has been through an accident or something of the sort, chances are they are a scammer. They may go to great lengths to impersonate the person, or they may claim that something so heinous has occurred that they are unable to speak to you on the phone.
While some of us fear that at one point an authority figure, like the police or a doctor, will call us to tell us that something happened to a loved one, if they are rushing you to do something like send them money, it is definitely not real. You would be surprised just how many people fall for this scam.
If it happens to you, don’t give in to the panic and never ever actually send them money. Verify if what they say is real, if they are who they really claim to be, and then call the actual person to verify. Most of the time, it will be so obvious it’s a scam, you won’t even have to make that phone call.
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