Police warn of phone scams

PALMER — Law enforcement is warning of two phone scams, one of which has already turned sights on the Mat-Su Valley.

Palmer Police Detective Sgt. Kelly Turney said the scam that has hit the Valley involves a call originating from an out-of-state number. The call plays a pre-recorded message purporting to be from a bank or credit card company.

The message reports that there is a problem with the call recipient’s account and asks for a credit card number.

“We’ve already got three calls this afternoon on it in the last hour,” Turney said Thursday afternoon.

Turney suspects whatever phone bank is making the calls has a chunk of Palmer phone numbers. He thinks that might spread in the coming days to the rest of the Valley.

“We actually had one where someone did enter their information,” Turney said. “Once they did it hung up.”

With phones being routed the way they are, Turney said it’s extremely difficult for police to take action to prosecute whoever’s responsible.

“About the only action really we can take is to let people know the scam is out there,” he said

Turney cautioned residents not to give out personal information over the phone, especially Social Security numbers, dates of birth or credit card numbers.

“If you do unfortunately enter that information and you feel like after the fact that you shouldn’t have, call and cancel your card and contact your banking institution and let them know,” he said.

Alaska State Troopers are also warning about a scam involving jury duty. The caller in this case tells the recipient he or she has failed to show up to serve on a grand jury and that the court has issued a warrant for arrest.

When the recipient says he never received a summons, the caller asks for a Social Security number and date of birth to supposedly check for an error in the court system’s computers.

Trooper spokeswoman Megan Peters said this particular scam hasn’t hit Alaska yet, but has been reported in 11 states. Troopers are therefore trying to put the word out.

“If you’re going to give someone your Social Security number, it should be something that you set out to do,” Peters said. “People shouldn’t just be randomly calling you and asking for your personal information.”

Turney said he hadn’t heard of anyone locally receiving a call about jury duty either. But, he said, grand jury summonses usually come out at the end of the month and perhaps the scammers are just biding their time.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.