We all know that everyone is prone to receiving a few scam messages from time to time, but it seems that certain states experience even more aggressive waves of scams that raise alarms. The latest state to fall victim to the well-known transit violation scams is Iowa, as several Redditors have reported receiving text messages from the government, claiming recipients owe money and should pay a fine to avoid getting into trouble. Fortunately, several Reddit users have confirmed this is nothing but a scam and have shared tips on how to further avoid these things.
Reddit user Professional-Kiwi102 shared the image of a text message they got claiming it comes from the Iowa Government. The message mentions that the recipient has a traffic violation and should pay a fine to avoid points being deducted from their driver’s license. It also threatens that those who don’t pay will get their vehicle registration services suspended.
The thing that makes the message look like a blatant scam is the URL at the bottom, which ends with a “.help,” which is clearly a fake website.
Luckily, several Redditors caught wind of this, and with other scam attempts happening across the country, some people have shared tips on how to identify and avoid these fraud attempts.
Iowa Redditors Share Tips on How to Avoid the Scams
Since this is something that has been happening across the country and now in Iowa, several individuals shared some tips on how they can avoid the scam, but most importantly, identify it.
“I get texts claiming I have outstanding toll fees. Since Iowa doesn’t have toll booths, I knew it was fake.“
“The biggest tell for me in the one I got was in the parentheses under the link: ‘bandle the fine’“
Others were a bit more obvious with their advice, as the government never really texts people with messages like this or with threats about what will happen if they fail to pay something.
“They don’t text stuff like this.“
“The DOT does post about these frequently to warn people, thankfully. So hopefully the FB addicted elders see those posts at least.“
In the end, as many people advise, people should never follow a suspicious link or share their personal information online. It is always better to ask the authorities about this. Yet the fastest course of action is just to block these numbers, hopefully stopping them from bothering people anymore.
