If you’re still among the ranks of Bay Area road warriors navigating the web of freeways and crossing our seven state-owned bridges and the Golden Gate as well, you should be aware of another type of online scam—the texted or emailed Road and Bridge Toll Scam.
Unless you keep a log of all the commuter lane and bridge tolls you incur, you may just assume that the $12.46 or $15.38 demand for payment (complete with looming threat of added fees for late payment) is just a routine charge that slipped your mind. After all, that small of an amount is just chicken feed for all of us tech moguls who are lucky to live here in the Bay Area. Fortunately, we live in an area where there are only a few agencies that levy tolls, unlike the East Coast or middle states where toll roads and bridges cover the landscape like grey spaghetti.
Our bridges and commuter lanes are governed by the Bay Area Toll Authority (BATA), which manages toll revenues from the bridges and the electronic FasTrak toll payment system.
Scammers generally copy the logos of toll agencies or use names that mimic the real agencies when they ask for amounts similar to the amounts of the actual tolls. And they do not round off the figures, preferring to demand a $16.79 payment rather than $17 or $20. They’re hoping that you don’t notice the fake name or wonder about the amount—they’re hoping that you’ll just click the link and blast off the payment without even pondering the date and exact details of that trip you’ve completely forgotten about.
Of course, this scam is more common where there are numerous toll roads and multiple agencies managing those tolls—a state of general confusion that makes the scammers’ tasks much easier.
An article from the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) circulated information about this growing scam. It laid out what you should expect and how you should react to this particular ruse.
This is probably what you’ll see on your device:
• You’ll get a text or email about an unpaid toll from what appears to be a legitimate highway authority or a transponder agency such as FasTrak.
• You are urged to click a link to pay the toll, warning that late fees will result if you fail to pay immediately.
• The scammers hope you’ll just click and pay without looking into whether you actually owe an unpaid toll.
• The criminals’ goal is to get the money and payment information or to infect your device with malicious software that could lead to financial loss and identity fraud.
Here’s what you should do:
• If you get such a message, do not respond or click on any links.
• Instead, check your account using the tolling agency or transponder company’s legitimate website or phone number—not the contact information or links contained in the message.
• Use the “report junk” option on your smartphone to flag the message.
• If you receive one of these texts or emails, report it to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center, https://IC3.gov. You can also report the scam to the office of the State Attorney General, Rob Bonta at: https://oag.ca.gov/ecrime/httap, or the Better Business Bureau https://www.bbb.org.
Some Bay Area residents who travel for business or pleasure across the nation may receive these toll scams from other states and a host of fake agencies. This type of scam is considered phishing—or now called “smishing” if the message comes over your phone in the form of a text message.
If you take the extra time to look at the calendar and review your road miles, you can probably defeat these insidious little schemes. After all, don’t give your “chicken feed” to the vultures.
And that’s not all—parking meter QR code scams
Broadcast news stations all over California are reporting the rise of QR code scams on parking meters.
Recent reports said that fake QR codes were pasted on San Francisco parking meters. The bogus QR codes enable thieves to take unsuspecting motorists’ money with fake charges and to obtain information from their phones to steal their identity and install “trojan horses” on phones.
Some parking meters have legitimate QR pay-for-parking codes, but thieves have been out on the streets pasting bogus stickers over the real ones. The presence of a seemingly endless variety of parking vendors and payment methods makes it almost impossible to determine fake from actual.
It is now more important to look for red flags when using the QR codes, which are in use almost everywhere. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) warns if you use a QR code, carefully check the website you land on to look for misspellings, blurry images or logos or switched letters. (Example: “poy for parking” instead of “pay for parking.”)
Somehow it’s not so “easy” or “convenient” to park anymore.
