Names, numbers and logos can all be copied. Here's how to check who's really writing to you, whatever the message says.
Text Message
Chase: A payment of $842.00 to J. Morales is pending. If this wasn't you, call us on +1 555 0172
On this page
Text Message
Chase: A payment of $842.00 to J. Morales is pending. If this wasn't you, call us on +1 555 0172
From “PayPal Service” <[email protected]>to me
Your account has been limited. Confirm your details within 24 hours: https://paypal.
The caller says
“This is your bank's fraud team. Someone is trying to use your card. To stop it, we need to confirm a code.”
Examples. The names and amounts change; the shape doesn't.
The name proves nothing. The name on an email or a text, and the number on a call, can be set to anything, even your bank's real number.
A fake text can land in a real thread. Your phone groups texts by the name they show, so a scam can sit right under your bank's real messages.
Read the address, not the name. In an email, tap the sender's name to see the address. In a link, the website is named by the end of the address, just before the first single “/”: in paypal.com.account-check.example/login it's account-check.example, not PayPal. A well-known website's address only tells you where the page is: anyone can make a form, a page or a shared file on a big site.
Real details can be copied too. A logo, your name, your address, the last digits of your card, or a quote from a real email don't prove who's writing. Details leaked from other companies get reused.
It wants you to act now, through the message. A link, a number to call, a reply. That's the part to refuse.
Don't use anything the message gives you: not the link, not the number, not a reply.
Contact them yourself. Through their app, a website you type in, or a number you saved or that's on your card or bill. If they really need you, it will be there.
Still not sure? Check the message. We open its link on a phone and a computer, not yours, and tell you what it is.
Then delete it. You can report it to your police or your country's fraud reporting service. Your phone may also let you report it as junk or spam. In the US and UK, you can also forward a scam text to 7726.
In the US: ReportFraud.ftc.gov (the FTC's website, opens in a new tab)