A Lincoln woman was scammed out of $53,000 after a pop-up ad that appeared on her computer and a caller who claimed to work for her bank convinced her to transfer the money to an account in California, according to police.
The 85-year-old woman told police that a pop-up notification on her computer alerted her to an account made in her name on an online gambling platform, , Lincoln Police Sgt. Chris Vollmer said.
The notification provided a phone number for the woman to dispute the account, Vollmer said.
She soon received a call back from a scammer purporting to be an employee from her bank, who told the woman to drive to the bank and transfer $53,000 to a California-based account under the guise of a sting operation that would help authorities catch the online gambler using her information, Vollmer said.
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The woman followed the instructions and completed the transfer before alerting her son, a 66-year-old Lincoln man, to the situation.
Her son called police at around 11 a.m. Saturday to report the fraud and is working with his mother's bank in an attempt to recover the cash, Vollmer said.
Vollmer declined to identify the bank that helped the woman complete the $53,000 transfer.