The Social Security Administration is warning retirees about a \u201csignificant increase\u201d in a type of scam that could compromise your personal information.<\/p>\n
The SSA\u2019s Office of Inspector General issued an alert about imposter scam emails \u2013 emails that falsely claim to provide access to a recipient\u2019s Social Security statement. Clicking links in emails can lead to identity theft, financial loss, and compromised data, the agency warned.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are seeing a sharp increase in fraudulent emails designed to look like official Social Security Administration communications,\u201d said Michelle L. Anderson, Assistant Inspector General for Audit as First Assistant. \u201cThese messages are not from Social Security. Anyone who receives one should delete it immediately and report it.\u201d<\/p>\n
The scam emails are designed to look legitimate with official-looking language, logos, colors and formatting that encourage users to click links or download attachments. Once clicked, the links may install malware or direct victims to fake websites intended to steal personal and financial information.<\/p>\n
Common warning signs of the bogus email are:<\/p>\n
Messages claiming your Social Security statement is ready to download<\/p>\n
Embedded links or attachments labeled as statements or documents<\/p>\n
Messages creating urgency or pressure to act immediately<\/p>\n
Sender addresses that do not end in \u201c.gov\u201d<\/p>\n
If you get one of the emails, don\u2019t click on any links and delete the email. If you need to access your Social Security account, type ssa.gov\/myaccount.<\/p>\n
What if you\u2019ve clicked on a link in a scam email?<\/p>\n
Stop all communication with the suspected scammer.<\/p>\n
Contact your financial institutions to protect accounts.<\/p>\n
File a complaint with the FBI\u2019s Internet Crime Complaint Center at ic3.gov<\/a>.<\/p>\n Report the scam to the Federal Trade Commission at ftc.gov<\/a>.<\/p>\n If you lose money, contact your local law enforcement.<\/p>\n Read the original article on al.com<\/a>. Add al.com<\/a> as a Preferred Source by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Social Security Administration is warning retirees about a \u201csignificant increase\u201d in a type of scam that could…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":384996,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[72,176,171370,61,60,103550,174,175,1615,1617,169175],"class_list":{"0":"post-384995","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-finance","10":"tag-fraudulent-emails","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland","13":"tag-office-of-inspector-general","14":"tag-personal-finance","15":"tag-personalfinance","16":"tag-social-security","17":"tag-social-security-administration","18":"tag-warning-signs"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384995","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=384995"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384995\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/384996"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=384995"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=384995"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=384995"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}