Scammers using real names of federal officials

If you’re a con artist trying to convince a consumer that they’ve really won $1.5 million in a sweepstakes, why not put a government “authority” on the line to confirm that it’s all true?

A man in his 70s in Washington state “heard” from Stacy Canan, who leads the Office for Older Americans at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in Washington, D.C.

Except it wasn’t Stacy Canan. But the man didn’t learn the truth until after he had wired $50,000 up front to cover taxes on the sweepstakes money that wasn’t real, either.

The con artists are going to great lengths to falsely use the names of big companies, like DTE Energy in Detroit; big government agencies, like the Internal Revenue Service; and now real people’s names, like Canan’s, that might be Googled to seem real.

It’s all part of the plan to make the pitch seem as legitimate as possible in order to persuade someone that it’s wise to wire money up front to collect on a sweepstakes. Or put cash on a GreenDot debit card to pay old heat or electric bills when a caller demands cash on the spot. And sure, put money on an iTunes card to pay off the IRS.

DTE Energy and other utilities are warning consumers about a rash of bill-collecting impostors who are so sophisticated that their bogus callback numbers even include recorded greetings and prompts that sound like DTE’s real customer service line.

The energy bill scam often focuses mainly on businesses in a given area on a given day — local restaurants, auto repair shops, hair salons and the like.

“They always use what I call an artificial deadline to pressure you,” said Michael Lynch, director and chief security officer for DTE Energy in Detroit.

“They’ll always say the truck is on the way to shut you off.”

Mary Plaza, 52, a manager for Down River Body Works in Allen Park, Mich., ended up taking $980 to a Kroger last July to pay the bill for the auto repair shop after some scammers convinced the owner that the gas would otherwise be turned off soon.

The amount of the bill didn’t seem outrageous for the business since some of its bills can be around $2,400 a month.

The story line the scammer used involved something about DTE claiming that the account numbers for the business had changed and some payments weren’t made.

The caller created a do-it-nowor-else sense of urgency.

Plaza said gas is needed as part of the paint process to repair cars. “Our business is huge. If anything is shut down here, I’m in trouble,” she said.

She bought GreenDot prepaid cards, scratched off the back to reveal a number on the card and read that number to the person on the phone. The money is gone when the scammers transfer the cash to another account to access the money at an ATM or spend it online.

In some cases, clerks at stores like Rite Aid have warned consumers too by asking why they’re putting so much money on Green Dot MoneyPak cards or iTunes cards.

DTE said about 200 people were scammed last year by fake bill collectors and customers lost a total of about $120,000.

Why are the con artists going after small business owners?

Lynch at DTE said some information for a business easily can be found online. A little bit more information can be picked up with an initial phone call to make the fake collectors sound even more legitimate.