By County 17, Cowboy State Daily
A 69-year-old Gillette man is out $1000, after falling prey to an international scammer claiming to be tech support.
This is the second such incident reported to the Gillette Police Department (GPD) this week.
The man reported that he’d received a call from someone claiming to be an Apple support person calling about disputed iTune charges, GPD Sgt. Eric Dearcorn said Thursday.
The man had been asked to purchase two eBay gift cards at Walgreens and an additional three gift cards from Smith’s Food and Drug for a total of $1,000.
After reading off the gift card numbers to the caller following his purchasing, the caller hung up at which point the man reported the scam to GPD.
This scam is part of a growing trend with 270% more Americans falling victim to phone scams in 2020 over the prior year, according to a December survey by First Orion, a communication solutions company.
in 2020, Americans reported paying out nearly $19.7 billion to scammers, per an online survey conducted by The Harris Poll.
According to the same poll, the amount of money lost by Americans last year increased by $9.2 billion from 2019.
