Threat and Extortion Scams

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Threat and Extortion Scams

The traditional emails claim that the sender has been paid to kill you; however, they will cancel their contract on your life if you pay them a large amount of money.

The new variation of email claims to be from the FBI in London. In the email there is an explanation that a person has been arrested recently for the murders of three people of United Kingdom and USA citizenship.

When the suspect was searched, information was found on him that indicated that you were to be the next victim.

You are then asked to contact the FBI in London via a link in the email to assist with the investigation. If you reply to the email you will be asked to provide proof of identification before any further information is provided to you about how your name is involved, and the future risks to you.

The link of course is fake and doesn't take you to the FBI in London, and the goal is to commit identity theft by stealing your personal details.

Identity theft can be accomplished through many variations of storyline, names or agencies involved.

Providing your personal details in reply to an unsolicited email is very risky and can leave you open to identity theft.

There is also a more serious threat currently being targeted at ethnic business owners, mostly of Asian origin using the telephone to deliver threats of violence. The telephone calls appear to originate from foreign countries and the caller appears to possess a reasonable amount of open source information about the victim by using Internet searches.

As a result, the victims may believe the caller has personal knowledge about them.

The victims are requested to provide money to prevent the violence happening. There have not been any reported incidents of violence actually carried out to date.

If you have received emails of this nature that contain threats or that contain personal details about you, contact the police and file a complaint at www.ic3.gov

Remember - always watch for scams!

Steve