By Mary O’KEEFE

Bank of America (BOA) shared a warning of a recent and trending scams concerning the Zelle® program, an application that allows users to send and receive money from people they know and trust.

The scam is known as “The Pay Yourself Scam” and, according to BOA, the details include:

Targeted victims will receive a text message that looks like a fraud alert from their bank about unusual activity. The text may look something like “Did you make a purchase of $100.00 at ABC merchant?”

If targeted victims respond to the text, they have now engaged the scammer and will receive a call from a number that appears to be from a bank.

[Scammers] will appear to be a representative from a bank and will offer to help stop the alleged fraud by asking people to send money to themselves with
Zelle®.

The scammer will ask for the one-time code targeted victims just received from a bank. If the code is given, the scammer will use it to enroll the bank account with Zelle® using the victim’s email or phone numbers.

The scammer now has the ability to receive the victim’s money into their own account.

There are a few things people can do to keep themselves protected from this scam including:

• Do not trust caller ID (identification). Scammers can “spoof” the number. According to the FCC (Federal Communications Commission), “spoofing” is when callers deliberately falsify the information transmitted to a person’s caller ID display to disguise their identity.
• Do not share codes based on a call received and don’t be pressured to act immediately. Scammers often use intimidation and fear to get their victims to act quickly without taking time to think the situation through.
• And as always if it seems suspicious contact law enforcement.