Indiana State Police officials are sounding the alarm about another phone scam involving their agency.
State police officials have received several concerns from people who received phone calls from scammers posing as ISP troopers. The caller ID for the scam calls say “Indiana State Police” and have the agency’s general phone number — 317-232-8248, according to an ISP news release.
The scammers will identify themselves as state troopers and tell the recipients they have drug charges pending in Texas. They then threaten citizens with arrest if a payment is not made to deal with the “charges,” officials say.
This is the second ISP phone scam reported by the agency in the last month. In early February, ISP’s Indianapolis post reported they had been given reports of scammers posing as troopers and telling people to pay to make warrants go away.
Because of the scams, ISP officials are reminding Hoosiers that these types of phone scammers are pervasive and tech-savvy. They will often play on emotions and fears to get to residents’ money, the news release says.
Officials also say ISP will never call and ask for or demand payments.
The easiest way for Hoosiers to protect themselves from being scammed over the phone is either to ignore unsolicited calls from unknown callers or hang up when something doesn’t seem right. People should never provide any information over the phone to an unknown caller regarding their personal identity, social security number, bank accounts or credit card numbers, officials say.
If someone is in doubt or believes they may have fallen victim to a scammer, they should hang up and immediately report the incident to local police. People should also spread the word about the scams to protect people who could potentially fall victim, officials say.
