Pub. 6 2017 Issue 7

l e a d i n g a d v o c a t e f o r t h e b a n k i n g i n d u s t r y i n k a n s a s 28 By Tom Wilbur, President/CEO, BANK VI, Salina, Kansas LOOKING FOR LOVE IN ALL THE ITUNES SPACES I n the financial services industry, we are seeing a higher incidence of fraud propagated against folks who are vulnerable to scams—people who don’t understand or can’t comprehend the level of financial fraud going on in the United States, and around the world, today. If there’s nothing else you get from this piece today, please remember this: When you have been contacted through social media, or by phone, to help a “friend” pay their bills, secure assets, buy an ITunes Gift Cards for them, or accept checks on their behalf, and you have never met this “friend” in person, it’s highly likely that you are being scammed. Stop all dealings with this “friend” immediately. By staying involved, you may be injecting yourself into the process of committing fraud against others, and you yourself may be subject to potential criminal prosecution, for your involvement in the fraud. If you are contacted by phone or email by someone pretending to be the Internal Revenue Service, the government, the utility company or someone who is threatening you for the immediate payment of money, hang up, or delete the email, and notify authorities, or the FTC. Kind and caring folks who are typically older and single just looking for a pal, or a friend, or a partner in life, are among the most vulnerable. They just don’t understand what they are doing. It’s tough to watch. And harder to respond to these situations. Some of you are receiving large checks, and depositing them, and then wiring money out to people you don’t know. Some of you are being told to send photos of ITunes Gift Cards you’ve bought, in lieu of sending money, for purchases as large as cars. The cars aren’t there when you go to pick them up. Hello. Some of you are getting emails from a fake email account, that’s meant to look like they are from someone you know, and you immediately go to work to do as instructed, with some financial card or means, by e-mail or phone. You’re just trying to help while the person on the other end of the line is helping themselves to your money. Hello. Some of you are being sent credit cards and going to the bank to try and get a cash advance on a VISA or Mastercard merchant machine, and if successful, further being asked to go buy ITunes Gift Cards so you can forward the images as soon as possible to a “friend” or their agent. Hello. Some of you are getting cries for help by phone or e-mail letting you know that someone close to you is in jail, incarcerated in and area they are traveling in, and they need funds to get out of a desperate situation. And then you’re asked to send that money with money orders, or you guessed it, images of ITunes Gift Cards. Hello. Some of you have received the call or letter of your lifetime— you’ve won a huge amount of money, and the folks on the other end just need the money to securely get the money to you, so there will be a fee. They may even send you a check to deposit to help send money back to them, right away. Hello. Some of you have even opened credit card accounts jointly with your “friend” and your friend is charging up the limit as fast as they can, and they are asking for ITunes Gift Cards, as the cherry on top. Hello. The bells should be ringing, folks. These hucksters are not your friends. This is a statement from Official Apple Support: Be aware of scams involving iTunes Gift Cards. A string of scams is taking place asking people to make payments over the phone for things such as taxes, hospital bills, bail