FARMINGTON – Franklin Memorial Hospital has been alerted to an incident of a person receiving a phone call from what appeared to be the hospital’s telephone number 207-778-6031. The caller, employing a tactic known as spoofing, persistently requested the recipient’s Medicare number.
A spoofing caller deliberately falsifies the information transmitted to your caller ID display to disguise their identity and spoof a number from a company that you may already know and trust. If you answer, they use scripts to try to steal your personal information such as Medicare and Social Security numbers, which can then be used in fraudulent activity.
If this should happen to you, end the call without delay and alert local law enforcement.
To safeguard yourself, follow these guidelines provided by the Federal Communication Commission (FCC):
• Don’t answer calls from unknown numbers. If you answer such a call, hang up immediately.
• Use caution if you are being pressured for information immediately.
• Never give out personal information such as account numbers, Social Security numbers, mother’s maiden names, passwords or other identifying information in response to unexpected calls or if you are at all suspicious.
To learn more visit https://www.fcc.gov/spoofing.
If you think you’ve been the victim of a spoofing scam, you can file a complaint with the FCC.
