Melody Ogle was dining at a restaurant when she received a text message saying her debit card had been deactivated and to call a certain number to resolve the issue.
The Dalton area resident called the number and was instructed by a professional sounding message to provide her card number, PIN (personal identification number) and other confidential information. The next morning when she checked her account balance, several hundred dollars was missing.
Ogle is one of several local residents claiming to be victimized in a scam in which they were led to believe the sender was Georgia United Credit Union.
“There were 30 other people here (at the credit union in Dalton) this morning that the same thing happened to them,” she said Friday.
Maj. John Gibson with the Whitfield County Sheriff’s Office said that office had received 10 reports of the scam just in the past day or two. Such scams are not uncommon, he said, but finding the instigators is often difficult since many operate from outside the country and work over the Internet.
Bottom line: When in doubt, call your financial institution.
Doug Foote, executive vice president for Georgia United, said the scams “happen all the time in the banking community,” and not just to Georgia United. He said the text message the customers he knew about received didn’t actually claim to be from the credit union. Instead, because the message listed some of the numbers on the customers’ accounts, they assumed it was from the credit union.
“They shoot you a text to see if you’ll bite,” he said. “These folks are good at what they do. Unfortunately, they’re very good at what they do.”
Foote said the bank, or any financial institution, will never send a text or email asking for your debit or credit card number or your PIN. After all, he said, they already have that information.
Gibson said financial institutions will sometimes verify some personal information in a call the customer initiates to make sure they’re speaking to the correct person. That’s different, he said, than a financial institution calling you to get information they should already have.
Resaca resident Jamie Holt said she narrowly escaped getting robbed through the same scam. She too received a text about her card. “GEORGIA CU ALERT:” it read. “Your CARD starting with 4791 has been DEACTIVATED.” It directed the recipient to dial a phone number.
Holt said she dialed the number, and, unfortunately, provided her full card number but sensed there was something suspicious and didn’t give any more information. Worried, she later contacted Georgia United where a representative helped her. While she didn’t lose any money, she did have to ditch that debit card and get a new one.
“There’s a lot of people probably out there just like me that are in the same situation,” she said.