Email scams are increasingly involving iTunes gift cards, instead of the old wire transfers. Lily Hay Newman as the scoop.
This trend is on the rise among scammers, both for individual targets and organizations. The Federal Trade Commission reported in October that 26 percent of people who report being scammed in 2018 said they bought or reloaded a gift card to deliver the money, up from seven percent in 2015. The FTC says that gift card-related losses reported to the agency totaled $20 million in 2015, $27 million in 2016, $40 million in 2017, and $53 million in the first nine months of 2018 alone.
Check It Out: Email Scams Increasingly Involve iTunes Gift Cards
Andrew:
This was inevitable. Last year, I played along with scammers clearly calling me from Mumbai (I recognised accents) pretending to be US IRS agents accusing me of having underpaid my income taxes and insisting on payment via Google Play cards to be deposited at an undisclosed location near me.
So, why not Apple iTunes gift cards? I should have asked.