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| BBB says it's the victim of identity theft |
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| Michael Sorkin |
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10/25/2008 - St. Louis — The Better Business Bureau sees thousands of consumer complaints about identity theft. Now the bureau is warning that scammers are impersonating the BBB in e-mail messages and blog postings.
Those messages aren't from the BBB, the real BBB said Friday in an alert.
"The messages and posts are likely part of a large-scale phishing scam ... to entice recipients and bloggers to open messages and access attachments or links," the alert warns.
Tracy Hardgrove, vice president of operations for the BBB in St. Louis, confirmed that the warning is "the real deal."
She said the Secret Service, which investigates some financial crimes, is investigating.
Hardgrove urged consumers not to click on the links or respond in any way to the messages. Doing so, she said, could download a virus on a computer.
The phony messages are signed "Council of Better Business Bureaus." The real council is the umbrella organization for local BBBs.
The council, in Arlington, Va., says the scammers are sending the phony material nationwide.
In St. Louis, Hardgrove said, the messages began surfacing on Wednesday "when businesses starting contacting us and telling us that the messages looked suspicious."
They looked suspicious because they asked recipients to update their contact information to receive new, more secure software, Hardgrove said.
"And the bureau is always telling people, never do that," she added.
The real BBB urges consumers to take precautions:
— Don't open suspicious messages.
— Report receipt of the message to phishing@council.bbb.org.
— View updates on the phishing attack at bbb.org/securityalerts.
To contact the BBB, call 314-645-3300 or click on stlouisbbb.org.
msorkin@post-dispatch.com | 314-340-8347
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