By Staff
August 29th, 2018
BURLINGTON, ON
The Halton Regional Police Service (HRPS) has been made aware of a fraudulent telephone call being made to a resident which appear to be coming from the Service’s non-emergency telephone number (905-825-4777).
This is known as spoofing, a caller on Canadian telephone systems can easily make a call appear from any number. Fraudsters will do this in order to hide the true origin of the call.
At this time, we are aware of only one incident in the last week of the Service’s non-emergency telephone number being used for fraudulent representation. The caller purported to be “police” to the person receiving the call and advised that a relative had been arrested. The caller stated that funds were required to be paid so that the relative could be released from custody. The person receiving the call was then requested to deposit funds into a Bitcoin ATM.
Please note that there are NO circumstances in which you will be legitimately contacted by the Halton Regional Police Service with an originating number displaying on your caller i.d. as 905-825-4777.
Outgoing calls from HRPS landline telephones will never be displayed as 905-825-4777.
This spoofing activity does not represent a data breach, nor does it represent a records information breach. Any and all personal information on file with our Service is secure, and the protection of this information remains our highest priority.
No police service in Canada will ever request an individual to deposit funds using Bitcoin or any money transfer service to secure the release of anyone.
If You Receive a Call Identifying as 905-825-4777:
Do not provide information to anyone contacting you from caller i.d. 905-825-4777.
Take steps to verify anything you have been told by the caller, including finding relevant phone numbers yourself to make call backs on.
Be aware that there are a number of popular scams that are currently utilizing caller id scamming.
Please do your part in sharing this message with your friends and family and help us to create more awareness of this type of fraud.