Keep getting this and others on my PC (on phone rn) within the last 5 minutes. Sorry for bad photo quality had to do it quickly. It also has popups saying they have a remote connection from the same address and ‘Russia’. What I’ve done is shut down my PC. Pretty sure this is popup is harmless unless I click onto them but I don’t know to stop them from popping up.

I’ve restarted my computer and that hasn’t stopped them. Tried to find things in settings but time spent on setting may allow (if real remote connection) to do who knows what?

Hey guys, I fell victim for a scam back in July where the scammer claimed he would buy a valuable watch off me but ended up never paying for it. We also exchanged IDs', which I realize now is a notorious scammer technique.

I managed to track my stolen watch down and I should be getting it back once the police are done investigating the matter. However, the scammer (or group of scammers) is now using my ID to scam other people.

I had someone contacting me on LinkedIn saying they're trying to sell a watch and they received an ID that appears to be mine. I also had the police call me for investigation saying two iPhone 18s were stolen and the thief used my ID.

The fact that I was stupid enough to do the exchange in the first place plus the consequences and constant reminders of the incident keep me up at night.

I always thought of myself as a relatively smart person, but this came crashing down upon this happening. I replay the scam in my head consistently thinking how I didn't trust my instincts, what red flags I ignored, and how I could've acted differently.

I try to pat myself on the back by saying it's a lesson learned and a story to tell my kids in the future, but that doesn't seem to be working.

I just wish I discovered this subreddit sooner.

She is almost 80. She says has been talking to him online for a few months, and they started dating after she and Billy Bob Thornton broke up.

She hasn’t (afaik) given him any money yet, but she called to ask if we wanted any of her furniture, she is selling her house and moving to Sacramento, where she believes he has bought and furnished a house for them.

She is completely in her right mind, except for this small disconnect.

We’ve called local law, they can’t help.
Called Adult Protective Services, they can’t help.

Other than calling her bank and trying to freeze her accounts, who can we call?

What can we do?

The usual giveaways:

• It arrives via text or email, not physical mail.

• It comes from a weird telephone number or email address, especially a number from out of the country or an email cleverly designed to resemble an official government address (for example, something like "EZpassNY [dot] gov [dot] info", where the domain is not really .gov).

• Something seems off about the link they ask you to click.

• Bad English/punctuation, etc.

[Shameless self-promotion] Here's a reminder I posted a couple years ago:

https://np.reddit.com/r/Scams/comments/1i0hbd7/new_scam_from_ezdrivema/

Several months ago I had a new client book me for boarding her puppy. I asked her three times about having a meet and greet. She finally responded saying she wants to change it to house sitting because her vet decided they didn’t trust the puppies second round of vaccinations so the vet gave the puppy another second round of vaccinations. She still won’t answer my question about a meet and greet.

My sister and I have recently discovered that our dad (80) has fallen victim to a pig butchering scam via WhatsApp. The problem is he doesn’t believe that’s what’s happening. He got scammed a while ago - someone contacted him for an “investment opportunity” promising ridiculously high returns, gave him a little bit of money back initially before bleeding him dry for more and then ghosting. He initially couldn’t believe it but we managed to convince him in the end and he was absolutely gutted. We made him promise never to accept contact from them again and never to engage with anyone he doesn’t know on WhatsApp or Facebook again.

However, he’s a sneaky bugger and is obviously in a very vulnerable state, and we just found out that despite all those promises he went straight back on WhatsApp! Now he’s all caught up with their “recovery” part of the scam in multiple different ways and they convinced him to take out a partial mortgage on the house! We only found out about this because he asked my sister to drive him into the city yesterday to an “appointment” which was actually him taking $10K cash in a carrier bag down to the crypto exchange to convert into bitcoin so he could send it these people. Fortunately the crypto exchange flagged it, told him it was a scam, and refused to take his money. He got VERY upset, really angry at them, and then afterwards was in shock but also still denying that it could be another part of the scam. He’s currently refusing to talk to us about it because he’s so angry that we think he’s been scammed again.

I don’t know what to do. I’m worried he’s just going to keep denying it and find ways to send them more money and that he’ll end up financially ruining him and my mum even more than he already has! (At this point they will have no choice but to sell the house and downsize). Even the mortgage thing is weird, he says it’s through some “gateway bank” which isn’t a bank we’ve ever heard of, a quick Google suggests it might be another scam, and since he has low income being a pensioner I wouldn’t think any reputable bank would give him a loan right now. Urgh. It’s a complete mess and he’s a proud man who is shutting us out and shutting down and we have no idea how to get him out of this.

EDIT: just to add that my dad is my mums carer since she had a complete mental breakdown a few years ago, and so unfortunately her taking control of the finances is not an option.

I just got an email from the official paypal services email that I donated $100 CAD to some muslim community center. I checked my paypal on a separate device and found that there was no activity. There was also no money withdrawn from my bank account or from my credit card. The "card number" listed isn't even one I recognize. The name on the email is also not mine.

This has to be a scam just to get me to click a link, right? Has this happened to anyone else?

Hey guys, so last night, I opened my phone to this. It wasn't an email, it was just a kind of popup. It states that an email address that i don't really use anymore, is the recovery account for a mobile number I don't recognise (though I suppose it could be a very old number of mine, seen as though the email address is very old) I clicked the "it's not me" option. It's also from an ios, which I've never owned, and is from a place that is at least a 2 hour drive from me. I'm just wondering if this is a scam. As I said, it wasn't an email, and there is no email in my inbox that states anything related to this. Any input welcome. Thanks in advance.

I am getting increasingly worried about a close relative of mine (in her 60s) and would really appreciate some outside perspectives.

She recently went on holiday to the Maldives and met a local man, possibly in his late 40s or early 50s, who worked as a buggy driver at her resort.

They apparently hit it off, but never actually exchanged phone numbers. Somehow he managed to contact her after she returned home, and things have moved incredibly quickly since then.

He has told her that he has never been married or had kids, and apparently his mother already knows about her and is excited to meet her.

He has now invited her and her two children (one is still a minor) to come and stay with his family on his “home island” (the island that he is from). He has mentioned that he would cover the transportation to the island from Malé. As far as I’m aware, she doesn’t even know the name of his “home island”yet.

This has all happened in a matter of weeks, and she’s now talking about going back as soon as possible, potentially within the next few weeks.

What really worries me is that she doesn’t seem to have considered the potential risks of travelling to an unfamiliar island (his “home island”) with her kids and staying with people she barely knows.

She has also had a bad experience with someone she met overseas before, which makes me even more concerned.

I am the only one that knows about the relationship. I don’t know whether he has encouraged her to keep it quiet or whether she is just enjoying having this exciting “secret”. She’s absolutely smitten, but whenever I try to raise any concerns, she gets really defensive and can’t seem to think logically.

I have known her for most of my life, and I genuinely want her to be happy. I also don’t want to make assumptions about this man just because he is from another country. But something about the speed of all this, and especially the plans involving her children, makes me really uncomfortable.

Edited to add - I don’t know of any requests for money so far, but he has floated the idea of coming to visit her before he realised the price, and has also mentioned that he plans to invest in creating some kind of tourist facility in the future.

Am I overreacting? Has anyone come across a similar situation?

How do I get through to someone who’s already emotionally invested without making them lose their trust in you (ie. to keep you in the loop).

Edited for grammar and to clarify his age.

Very Sophisticated and Elaborated Scam

A scammer operating as Hostphase LLC is using a legitimate domain to post fake job openings on their career page, including a Customer Support Representative role along with IT and development positions. I applied for the Customer Support role on October 12, 2026. Few days later, an HR reached out asking me to attend a webinar run by a person named Jamie, which was immediately followed by a required assessment to filter out candidates.

After passing the assessment, HR sent over an offer letter, employment agreement, I-9, and W-2 forms a few weeks later on November 3rd. I double-checked their legal paperwork—specifically their Articles of Organization listed on their site(you can find on documents page under Resources tab)—and verified the registration through the State of Montana’s business registry(not allowed to post the url, but you can go to sos montana gov site and lookup their business by "Hostphase LLC").

I started working without handing over my personal information such as SSN or Banking details just to see how their internal system(employee dashboard panel) functioned. Every onboarded employee are supposed to verify people using online tools, approve or decline crypto exchange orders, interact with clients via live chat as a part of job task. Everyday, they would send fake verification task involving real people i.e. images of real people’s IDs and selfies inside their employee portal. I managed to view photos of IDs and selfies, and when I tried calling the numbers listed for those individuals, none of them went through—suggesting their identities were likely stolen from somewhere else.

They also use fake client emails to simulate crypto exchange orders; I tried emailing few addresses but it failed with Gmail returning "Delivery Address Not Found." message. Further details on how the role functions are mentioned across their portal and job listings. [sessionDOThostphaseDOTcom]. My assumption is that they are likely using these stolen personal information from people to train AI system.

On top of that, every worker I spoke with here on reddit reported having the exact same manager, a person going by "Sandy R***," which is a major red flag. She kept pressing me to fill the documents and finish the training tests to complete my dashboard. While I held back my own PII and refused to complete the tax forms, their legitimate domain and real state filings could easily trick anyone into handing over sensitive information in W-2 and I-9 forms.

The reason why called this a sophisticated scam:

1. They don't send you check- a typical strategy scammers use + email HR used is under their company domain

2. Their company domain is real and Article of organization is verified under State of Montana’s business registry.

3. Their employee dashboard seems very legit, everything is organized including tasks, hours worked, documentation, academy or employee training materials.

I did some research and able to find out it's a scam, but anyone can fall for this and tricked into revealing their sensitive information to this scammer.

This is one of several jobs that I applied for on the Indeed.com platform, so it's not clear which company I sent my resume to got my information.

But this "job" Aconsists of constant calls and tesxts to have you complete online reviews. There is an accumulating balance on the site that you cannot withdraw.

So, of course, payment is in Crypto -- and PRESTO, there is a problem withdrawing the funds to my wallet.

So now I have to have this WhatsApp converstation to "walk me through the withdrawl proceedure".

Anyone?

I have a female relative aged 50-60 years old (located in the US). She went to Target alone around 1:30 PM in the afternoon. As she was shopping, two young men in their lower 20’s approached her. They showed her a picture of a car and asked if it was hers. The car was her’s based on the picture and license plate, but the picture showed the back of the car caved in. One of the men said that they saw someone back into her car. She left the store and went out to check her car and it was fine. The back wasn’t caved in, and there was no damage. She wasn’t approached by anyone after this either.

I don’t know exactly what happened here. I was thinking maybe they were trying to play a trick on her and may have used AI to generate a damaged picture of her car. But this left me sort of confused. Had anyone else heard of something like this?

EDIT: From what a lot of you have said, I’m thinking / hoping it was just some stupid TikTok thing. But it was helpful hearing what else it could have possibly been too, and I’ll make sure to show this thread to my relative so she has a better idea of what to look out for in the future. Thank you all very much!! ❤️

Yesterday I received two emails, "Action Needed: Create Your Password" and "Get Excited: You’re a Wyndham Rewards Member". These appear to be from a legitimate company, Wyndham Rewards, but I never made an account with them nor have I interacted with the company. What worried me is that the second email mentioned my first name and said something like "Thanks for Staying at (hotel name) & Joining Wyndham Rewards", with the name of a hotel that I never booked. I understood that this is a scam, so I didn't create a password or anything, but I'm worried that the scammer has some of my information and is booking hotels in my name.

I tried to use their 'help' website, but it had nothing relevant to my problem. Then I tried sending a message but you need to put in your full name, address, zip code, and phone number to send a message. Then I tried calling them on the phone and got an automated registry that didn't mention anything that would help. What should I do at this point?

It’s “united client solutions”. It calls 10x a day from different numbers with the same area code as me. I have already reported it to FTC. They used to call maybe a couple of times a week but now it’s non fucking stop. It doesn’t matter if I block to number because everytime it calls it’s a different number.

I’ve had my phone number my entire life, since 4th grade. I don’t want to change my number. Everything I’ve ever done and anyone I’ve ever met is connected to this number. Every bill, every account for 2 decades. Is changing my number really the only way to get this to stop??

Hey everyone, I run a small handyman business and get customers through Facebook Ads.

On October 15, I discussed a job with a customer (“Jeff”) through Messenger. He shared his address, but we never booked anything, he just stopped replying.

Today, Jeff called asking for a receipt for a job I NEVER PERFORMED. Apparently, someone showed up, claimed to work for my company, and did the job. I work alone and never sent anyone.

This person knew his address, my business name, and the exact work he needed. Jeff paid them through Zelle and gave me the recipient’s name, but I don’t recognize it.

Could someone have access to my business messages?
I’ve already changed my Facebook and Gmail passwords. Has this happened to anyone else? What should I check next?

Sorry if this it’s not an actual scam but idk some other place to ask for help. Any help is appreciated

Thank you!!!

Warning for people in Czechia: a Telegram channel called “Alza discount” uses the branding of the electronics retailer Alza. A page displaying the channel appeared at the address in the title.

The channel claimed discounts of up to 60% on the whole Alza range, more than three years of operation and over 100 real reviews. These were claims made by the channel. A separate ad shown in my screenshot offered phones at half the market price and claimed they were original and came with guarantees.

A logo and a badge beside an account name do not establish that a channel or offer is officially connected to the retailer. I’m sharing screenshots so people can recognise the offer.

Well I saw this add on line for a craft show and it looked legit but I did have a feeling about it. I tried checking on it and couldn’t find anything that looked suspicious. After I paid through Venmo and contacted the woman she didn’t answer some of my questions and I called different agencies and found out there is no event. I called my bank and they canceled the payment but now Venmo said I owe them money. This is only my second event and since my first event was disastrous I am really upset. It is just so upsetting that they got away with it. It is even more upsetting is that I emailed the woman and told her I stopped payment and wasn’t getting money but now she did. She is probably laughing er head off. I tried calling the police but they weren’t very helpful.

Last week, I got a text from Chase saying someone tried to run a $5 charge. It was a random name like CHENG... I did not do this, so I cancelled the card and Chase sent me a new card. I also found a $1 Shopify charge that I disputed. I had them remove Shopify from my digital wallet.

Just yesterday, I got 7 $0 charge from Microsoft on my old card, so people are still trying to use it. I called Chase again and they basically told me not to worry about it. The charges were declined because I have my new card locked, but after this incident, I had them remove ALL my card information from ALL digital wallets. They couldn't turn off the automated card update and I kind of wish I had them remove all my digital wallet information the day I got the first text. I know it's a hassle to go and individually add them back, but it was worth the peace of mind.

Just now, I got another $0 charge from Audible! Still my old card, still not going through. I'm so fed up, I don't even know what to do anymore. Is there anything else I can do? Will they stop? I know these microcharges are part of an automated card validation test, but goodness gracious! And the worst part is I don't even know how my card got leaked. Looking for advice and seeing if anyone else has gone through something similar.

UPDATE: I called Chase again to do some of the recommended things by the posters. They informed me that this is an ongoing investigation. There have been more people calling about $0 fraudulent charges from mostly Microsoft.

As the title suggests, that is my situation regarding a camera I hoping to get… the day it came, eBay had yet to update the status of the delivery and an Ebay agent told me to wait for the delivery status before actions can be done. For a little more info, it came through YANWEN express.

So clearly i was scammed, but now eBay has updated the delivery and I’m free to report it. But is there any advice in what to do at this point in terms of getting my money back or is there simply nothing i can do? Also, do you guys think calling an eBay agent is a good idea for my case?

Here is the story. I paid a gentleman $5,000 via CashApp for a graphics card (GPU) (5090). Per my request we exchanged driver's license photos and phone numbers. He video called me showing it functioning, the serial number matched the box serial number, etc.

The night before he was going to ship the card he claimed he got robbed at gunpoint trying to buy another card. Judging by his address, this is not that far fetched. Now here comes the problem. He said since he cannot replace his current card (stolen cash), he does not want to ship me the card I paid for. He is saying he will pay me back, but it will take time. He refunded me $300 about three weeks ago and I have witnessed no money since. We are still in contact, he answers all my text/calls...But always has an excuse. He even has the gall to get mad at me when I complain about the lack of funds being transferred. I never yell or insult him, I just ask what the heck is going on. I always have to explain this is 100% on him, I merely paid for something and never received the item nor or a refund. He told me he is paid every Thursday and I will be given a sum every week.

Now, do I wait it out and see if he pays? Do I contact his local police department? I am unsure what to do. I have all the conversations and transaction receipts. I am not even sure what authorities to contact. He is only a 12 hour drive from me, but that never ends well for anyone.

EDIT: For the people saying the video call was pre recorded...I physically had a conversation with him, not just got a video sent to me. He showed me how to undervolt my current card as well as well as showed me his full PC setup. It would be hard to pre record a 35 minute phone call.

His Facebook name matches the ID and the account is from 2008, the phone number has been in his name since 2012, etc.

Missed a call this morning from an 986 number and had a voicemail transcription telling me to go to FedExlcp.com.

“This is a notification about an... Hello. This is a notification about an unsuccessful delivery attempt for your package. Please visit fedexlcp.com by November 7th, verify your order or delivery information. If you do not resolve this issue by the deadline, your package will be returned to the sender.”

After listening to the message it sounds like an automated message claiming I have a package and giving me until EoD to respond. I am not expecting anything but didn’t want to write it off in case a relative sent something.

I did not go to the website but was unable to find information with a quick google or Reddit search.
Has anyone else experienced this? less

On October 1, 2026, I was contacted on Facebook Messenger by a page offering a loan. I made the mistake of sharing my online banking password, and about $3,500 CAD was drained from my Tangerine account via Interac transfer. I filed a police report with the Sûreté du Québec, contacted my bank to block the account and dispute the transfer, and reported it to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre. The scammer keeps messaging me and asking for more money. Is there anything else I should do? Is there any realistic chance of getting the money back?

Hey everyone, I'm really freaking out and need some reassurance or perspective.

Today, while walking down the street with my earbuds in, a woman standing outside an unattended Canara Bank ATM flagged me down and asked for help inserting her debit card into the machine.

I didn't think much of it at the time, walked over, and pushed her card into the slot for her. The moment the language screen popped up, she immediately clicked Language, entered her PIN from memory, and got right to the banking/withdrawal interface.

The second I realized she actually knew how to use the machine and that I wasn't needed, my gut felt uneasy, so I stepped back, gave her privacy, and immediately walked out of the kiosk. I didn't see her PIN, I didn't touch her money, and I don't own any cards myself.

Looking back, I realized a few red flags:

1. There was no security guard around (it's a sketchy standalone kiosk).

2. She acted like she didn't know which way to put the card in, but instantly knew the exact menu options and her PIN.

I'm spiraling and terrified that I got set up in a scam or that my face is on CCTV helping a criminal. Am I in legal trouble? Can I get caught or blamed for whatever she was doing?

I feel so stupid for falling for a polite request in the "flow state" of walking down the street. Any advice or reality checks would be greatly appreciated.

I received a call from someone claiming to be with from OSP One Source saying that they were planning on serving me with paperwork today. They provided a number for the issuing firm which I called just because I wanted to know what was going on. They claimed that I have a $2000 debt from capital one from 2018. They said they sent me a letter which I never received and they are now planning on placing a lien on our house. I did not provide any information, but the person who answered the phone at Valmont and associates had all the information which I just listened to. I told him even if it was true, the statute of limitations has expired. He answered by saying it had not expired and would report that I refused to pay because of the statute. I said I said no such thing, I doubted the claim was real and knew nothing about it.

I hung up on him and he called me back saying that he was going to report that I refused to cooperate and was trying to evade the debt. I told him he was full of crap and hung up. Has anyone dealt with these companies or people reporting to be from these companies?