Faking Amazon refunds for PII and more

Fraudsters always find new ways to steal PII and money. This time, they’re sending customers to fake websites for fake Amazon refunds and putting a 21st century twist on a classic jury duty scheme. Plus, the FBI cautions that identity thieves are revictimizing people by posing as lawyers offering to recover funds for crypto investment scheme victims.

Maddy Smith received a text message from an Amazon employee explaining how she could get a full refund on an item she’d recently purchased. All she had to do was click on the link to the website in the message and enter her bank routing number. She followed the Amazon employee’s instructions and supplied her bank information for the refund. But a few days later, her bank informed her that a check she’d written had bounced. That’s when she learned that a fraudster had used her routing number to drain her bank account. She never got a refund from Amazon.

This case is fictitious, but it represents a very real scam — the Amazon refund scheme.

Inside the Amazon refund scam