The FBI issued a warning to Americans this month about a new “smishing” texting scam that says the target has unpaid road tolls.
Smishing is a mix of phishing, a scam wherein a victim is sent a message purporting to be from a legitimate organization asking the victim to provide personal and financial information, and short message service or SMS, the most common form of text messaging.
Since the beginning of March, the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) has received more than 2,000 complaints. The scam texts have impersonated road toll collection services used in at least three states, the IC3 alert said.
The FBI didn’t specify which states have been hit with the smishing scam.
The typical smishing message in this case has the toll service’s name, followed by “We’ve noticed an outstanding toll amount of $12.51 on your record. To avoid a late fee of $50.00, visit https://myturnpiketollservices.com to settle your balance.”
A slight variance is in the wording of each message, but the amount of money demanded is consistent across complaints, the FBI said. The phone numbers used by the scam are also different depending on the state.
The FBI recommends that recipients of one of these messages should file a complaint with IC3 containing the phone number and website listed within the text, check the legitimate website used by their state’s toll service, contact the toll service’s customer service number and delete the smishing texts.
• Brad Matthews can be reached at bmatthews@washingtontimes.com.
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