Fraudster Scams Ohio Woman Into Disrobing

JULY 31--A scam that began with a spoofed call ended with an Ohio woman being swindled out of $6000 and then tricked into disrobing so that she could “verify her identity” via a FaceTime call with the cruel fraudster, according to a police report.

The victim told police in Mayfield Heights, a Cleveland suburb, that she received a call last Tuesday from a number that appeared to be the customer service line for Huntington Bank, an Ohio-based financial institution.

The male caller--who spoke with an accent--told the woman that there was a “potential fraudulent charge pending” on her account. To safeguard her money, the purported bank employee said, she “would have to move her funds into a different account to avoid her money being stolen.”

With the scam artist still on the phone, the woman went to a local Huntington Bank branch (seen above) and withdrew $6000. She then was directed to a nearby Chase Bank ATM, where she deposited the cash onto a Chase debit card via her iPhone’s Apple Pay feature.

After having spent two hours on the phone with the man, the woman--whose name was redacted from the police report--returned home and got another call from the fraudster, who wanted to FaceTime with her. The man, who did not have his camera on, asked the woman to “provide them with a full body scan to verify her identity due to a failed transaction.”

The woman told cops that she “undressed and spun in circles on FaceTime” to confirm her identity. When the voice on the other end began to laugh, the woman realized that she had been scammed. And humiliated, to boot.

While police have subpoenaed various bank records, the likelihood of identifying the perp--probably working from a call center in India--are remote.

Prior to the woman being defrauded, the local sheriff had warned that area residents had been receiving “scam phone calls from the same” spoofed Huntington Bank number. The bank, cops noted, “advised that customer service will never reach out with a telephone call requesting information regarding your account.” (2 pages)