We've received a warning from the Federal Trade Commission about a scam for which we've also received multiple reports of this happening locally.

According to the warning, "One way to spot a scam is to understand its mechanics. A new and complicated scam starts with a call or text message about a suspicious charge on your Amazon account. But it’s not really Amazon. It’s a scammer with an elaborate story about fraud using your identity that ends with you draining your bank or retirement accounts.

"Here’s what to know about this scam scenario.

"It’s not Amazon calling. Scammers spoof their phone number to make it look like it’s Amazon calling. Don’t trust the number in your caller ID and don’t trust what the caller tells you. Worried about a suspicious purchase on Amazon? Log in through the website or app. Don’t call back the number that called you or a number someone left in a voicemail or text message."

You can learn more about this scam at THIS LINK.

It's pretty obvious there are no lengths that bad actors won't go to in order to scam people out of their money.

In a recent brazen attempt to do so of which the Norfolk Sheriff's Office has been made aware, an individual reported that they received a call from someone saying that they'd missed Federal jury duty, and that an arrest warrant had been issued for them.

This very sophisticated attempt at scamming the potential victim utilized a well-forged "United States District Court Arrest Warrant," which the scammer sent via text message to the potential victim while they were on the phone (click on the image to the left to expand this document).

On the document, you can see that the scammer was trying to get the "mark" to send them $2,900 as a "Pre-set Appearance Assurety." The scammer was also sophisticated enough that they sent a "click-to-pay" link to the target.

This is what the person targeted reported:

"I got a call that I was going to be arrested for failing to appear for jury duty. While on the phone with the person I was texted a warrant for my arrest.

"The person hung up on me after I said I was going to call my friend who was retired from the sheriff’s dept .The person really sounded convincing I could see how someone could fall for this scam."

The person targeted was savvy enough to recognize this was a scam, but would you?

DO NOT FALL FOR THIS AND REPORT IMMEDIATELY TO FRAUD WATCH.

The Norfolk Sheriff’s Office has been alerted by a major locally-based charity about a scam that targets businesses and charities for large donations.

An e-mail is sent which suggests that a person of importance within the charity approved a large donation. The scammers provide what looks like a conversation thread between the person of importance and the scammer that indicates the charity wishes to donate a large sum of money to a fake charity that the scammer represents. The person of importance then instructs the scammer to send an invoice for the donation to the financial representative for the major charity, who will then process it and remit the money to the fake charity.

In the case of the scam attempt in question, someone who is savvy to such fraud attempts caught it and reported it to NSO.

The “Pledge Invoice” shown here provides banking transfer information as well as some “legitimacy” by showing IRS numbers and the like.

DO NOT FALL FOR THIS AND REPORT IMMEDIATELY TO FRAUD WATCH.