ELYRIA, Ohio — When a 74-year-old Elyria resident was working on their computer earlier this month, multiple notifications appeared to alert the user their computer was infected with viruses and spyware.
Those alerts also provided the user a 1-800 number to solve the issue.
That’s when Elyria police say the resident was instructed to send $20,000 cash to an out-of-state address in order to clean the computer of the virus.
“The resident then arranged for the overnight shipment of a large sum of money via a common carrier service,” according to a press release from Elyria police.
After shipping the money, authorities said the resident had concerns and reported the incident on Jan. 19.
“Officers took immediate action to locate the package and determine its destination,” Elyria police said. “Contact was made with local law enforcement to attempt to identify the addressed recipient. Working with the carrier, detectives were able to successfully intercept the package and arrange for its safe return to the resident/victim.”
The incident remains under investigation.
Det. Bill Lantz with the Elyria Police Department warns that these types of scams are very common.
“Please take the time and talk with your family and friends – especially those that may be unfamiliar with computers and phones – about these scams,” Det. Lantz wrote in a press release. “The most common scammers request payments in the form of gift cards.”
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Editor's note: Video in the player above was originally published in an unrelated article on Jan. 20, 2022.
