Best practices
These steps make it easier to pause, verify, and recover. They are meant to be done now, not only after a suspicious call, text, email, or website appears.
Write down phone numbers for your bank, credit card, doctor, pharmacy, utility company, Medicare plan, and close family.
Use numbers from:A card, bill, statement, official letter, saved contact, or website address you typed yourself.
For any unexpected request involving money, accounts, legal trouble, medical benefits, immigration status, or computer access, stop first.
Before acting:Hang up, close the message, and call back using your trusted callback list or an official website you typed yourself.
Use different passwords for banking, email, Medicare, Social Security, shopping, and phone accounts.
Set up:A password manager or written password book kept at home, plus two-step verification when the account offers it.
Decide ahead of time that you will not pay an urgent stranger by gold, gift card, crypto, wire transfer, cash pickup, courier, or payment app.
Family agreement:No emergency request gets paid until you call the person back using a saved number or speak with someone you already know.
Turn on automatic updates for your phone, computer, browser, and important apps.
Also check:Use antivirus protection where appropriate, remove apps you do not use, and never allow remote access from an unexpected caller.
Look at bank, credit card, Medicare, insurance, and phone statements for charges, claims, or changes you do not recognize.
If something looks wrong:Call the company using the number printed on the card, statement, bill, or official letter.
Use phone spam blocking, mark scam texts as junk, unsubscribe only from emails from companies you recognize, and avoid answering unknown callers.
For suspicious messages:Do not reply, click links, scan QR codes, open attachments, or call the phone number inside the message.
Consider placing free credit freezes with Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion if you are not planning to apply for new credit soon.
Keep handy:ReportFraud.ftc.gov, IdentityTheft.gov, IC3.gov, and the phone numbers for your bank and credit card companies.