March is fraud prevention month and the OPP want you to be careful.
The OPP is taking the time to promote public awareness this month to prevent you from being a victim of a scam.
They say that Ontarian’s have lost approximately 45 million dollars due to fraud this year which represents only five-percent of victims that report them to the police.
There are four steps the OPP say you should follow:
- Gather all the information pertaining to the fraud
- Report the incident to the financial institution where the money was sent (a money service business like Western Union, PayPal or your credit card company)
- If the fraud took place online through Facebook, eBay, a classified ad such as Kijiji or a dating website then be sure to report the incident directly to the website
- Victims of ID fraud should place flags on all their accounts and report to both credit bureaus, Equifax and TransUnion
The OPP says the most important step to take is to report the fraud to your local police or the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre.