Jury Duty Scam Phone Calls
Thursday, August 20, 2009
This scam has surfaced again, so be prepared for a bogus phone call that could steal your financial identity. Most of us take summonses for jury duty seriously, but enough people skip out on their civic duty that a new and ominous kind of fraud has surfaced. The caller claims to be a jury coordinator following up on a jury duty summons you received. If you protest that you never received the summons, the scammer asks for your Social Security number and date of birth so he or she can verify the information and "cancel the arrest warrant".
Giving out this information could quickly lead to your identity being stolen. The fraud has been reported in 11 states, including Oklahoma , Illinois , and Colorado. This swindle is particularly insidious because intimidation is used over the phone to try to bully people into giving out personal information. The FBI and the federal court system have issued nationwide alerts on their websites, warning consumers about this fraud. Below are two verifications of the genuineness of this alert.
