The FBI is putting out a warning about a scam that has been affecting a number of people both locally and nationally.
According to Rochester Supervisory Special Agent, Ryan Braley, it involves scammers who might tell a victim their bank account has been compromised, and in order to protect their assets, to withdraw the cash or use the money to buy gold bars.
And then at that point, Braley said, the thieves would send a courier posing as a legitimate official to stop by the victim’s home and pick up the cash or gold bars and then would never be seen again.
He said these scammers often target senior citizens, partly because in some cases they are more trusting and also because they often have more money.
“Probably the biggest driving force is they've just had decades and decades of life to accumulate wealth,” said Braley. “And that's the thing that's most concerning for us about this particular scam, is we're seeing people lose huge amounts of money, half a million dollars, three-quarters of a million dollars, sometimes over a million dollars, all in one fell swoop.”
Braley said the FBI is trying to follow up on these reports with the victims.
“We're fielding calls directly from victims, also from our law enforcement partners on a weekly basis,” said Braley. “We've done some outreach to shops that sell gold, and they've been very receptive. And we've actually been able to circumvent some of these scammers victimizing certain people in the area.”
But Braley said they can’t always catch the scammers, and he said that “anyone who’s worked these kinds of cases will tell you that there are few things more heartbreaking than sitting at the kitchen table with an elderly victim when they come to the realization that they have lost everything that they worked their entire lives for."
The FBI said that from May to December 2023, the FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center saw an uptick nationwide in this activity, with total losses of more than $55 million. And Braley said these types of scams continued to show an increase in activity for the first half of this year.
Braley said that you should remember that no government official or legitimate business will ever request that you liquidate your bank account, and the FBI reminds everyone to protect their personal information and never to disclose your home address or agree to meet with unknown individuals to deliver cash or previous metals.
