The Pennsylvania Treasury has advised state residents that scammers are using fraudulent text messages to target recipients of unemployment compensation benefits, potentially including normal unemployment compensation (UC), Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA), and Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC).
One message inaccurately tells recipients that their state-issued ReliaCard account has been temporarily frozen. The message then encourages recipients to clink on a link to verify their identity and card status. Individuals should not click on the link. Neither the Pennsylvania Treasury nor the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry ever embed a link in a text message. Any text that includes a link and claims to be from these agencies should not be trusted.
Individuals should note that it is important to never provide any personally identifiable information, user IDs, or passwords unless they initiated the conversation by contacting the agency directly.
A copy of the full news release from the Pennsylvania Treasury Department is available at http://www.patreasury.gov by clicking on Newsroom and then the Scam Alert article.
Leave a Review