BOSTON (WHDH) - The Better Business Bureau is warning residents in Massachusetts, Maine, Rhode Island, and Vermont of a telephone scam that has made a reappearance in the last month.
There have been numerous reports of the “Can you hear me?” scam in the past two weeks, according to the BBB Scam Tracker.
The BBB says it has tallied nearly 10,000 reports of this phishing scam throughout the United States and nearly 150 reports in Massachusetts alone since 2017.
“The way it works is you’ll get a call from someone (many times automated) who tries to solicit you into saying ‘yes,’ typically by asking ‘can you hear me?’ They typically pretend to be with a company or department from an organization,” the BBB wrote in a post on its website. “For example, one scammer in a recent report from Massachusetts claimed to be from TripAdvisor, another said they were part of the ‘Rewards Department.'”
Scammers might try to use the recording of you saying “yes” to authorize a purchase, according to the BBB.
New England residents are being urged to ignore calls from unfamiliar numbers because answering will confirm the phone number is valid.
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