Los Altos Town Crier - LAPD uncovers new phone scam

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LAPD uncovers new phone scam

Written by Diego Abeloos

A Los Altos resident this morning (March 15) contacted police after nearly becoming the victim of an elaborate phone scam.

According to Los Altos Police Sgt. Cameron Shearer, the female resident received a phone call at approximately 9:30 a.m. from someone posing as an FBI agent. The fake agent informed the resident that the FBI recently recovered $600,000 in stolen Publisher’s Clearinghouse winnings earmarked for her.

Shearer said the resident grew suspicious after the suspect asked her to wire $1,800 to Mexico City to cover miscellaneous fees and receive the $600,000. The suspect then offered to have a local law enforcement official contact her to confirm the matter, Shearer added.

Approximately one hour later, the victim received that second phone call, with a suspect identifying himself as a Los Altos Police officer – using an actual officer’s name as his own during the conversation.

Shearer added that the suspect even managed to fraudulently spoof an actual Los Altos Police unit’s phone number. The victim’s caller ID listed the number as the Los Altos Police’s parking enforcement unit – 947-2777. Still suspicious, the resident contacted Los Altos Police to report the incident.

Shearer said the matter is currently under investigation.

2 Comments

1"I'd never fall for that!"
at Saturday, 16 March 2013 21:28by Cornelia

I would never buy a spiel that. There's a lot of more elaborate phone scams reported at www.callercenter.com and this story about a lottery winning for the victim is a very lousy one. Even without having to tell the victim to wire money to an unusual location, it's just an obvious bluff.

2Comment
at Monday, 25 March 2013 12:01by wow

wow, so the los altos police department allowed one of their phones to be used to try and run a phone scam? How do you "spoof" a land line? multiple bank robberies where the thief gets away, police phones used for a phone scam....something stinks with the los altos police. Reminds me that ex los altos cop volarvich that was suspected of robbing a bunch of banks before he killed himself.

http://www.sfgate.com/news/a rticle/Ex-Cop-Kills-Himself-After-Bank-R obbery-Former-2818394.php

i hope the city council starts taking a close look at the los altos police and how they allowed their phones to be "spoofed"

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