Unfortunately, in the day and age we are living in, scams are a dime a dozen. They come via phone call, text message, e-mail and regular mail, and are easy to fall for if you aren’t careful.
In each instance, criminals are trying to get ahold of your personal information — a social security number, checking account number, credit card account, etc. That’s why we should all be vigilant, and extra careful when dealing with unsolicited phone calls, emails or text messages.
Some scams have been around for a while, including the lottery scam. Now, a new version of the lottery scam is circulating in Virginia.
According to the Virginia Lottery, officials have noticed a recent uptick in reports of this scheme. Here is how it normally works.
You receive an email, text message or letter proclaiming, “You’ve won the lottery!” While most people would like to win a big lottery jackpot, these unsolicited emails and text messages are coming from scammers trying to steal your money. According to the Virginia lottery, the scammer will try to get you to pay them a “fee” or “taxes” to collect a non-existent prize, or they may try to get your bank account number, claiming they’ll wire prize money into it.
Fake lottery scams take many forms. In most cases, the criminals try to convince intended victims…
