In the second installment of our Protecting Against Fraud Series, we explore how to protect yourself from unwanted phone calls. We have all gotten them. Unsolicited phone calls can be annoying. They interrupt the flow of the day or your personal time. But your professional team at Provident State Bank wants to warn you about the dangers of interacting with these scam phone calls. The scammers making the calls are trying to steal your personal information. It is illegal to make a recorded sales phone call. Even though your number is on the Do Not Call Registry, you are not supposed to get any sales calls, but scammers ignore the rules. Calls from a live person may be from a familiar number on your caller ID. Scammers use technology to mask their calls to come from everywhere — the IRS, a neighbor, local business, or even your known number. These phone calls are fake and cannot be trusted. 

Your PSB team has compiled some helpful tips to avoid being scammed by these fake phone calls:

1) Hang up the phone: The people making the call are trying to access your personal information. Just hang up and move on.

2) Consider a call-blocking service: If you want to reduce the number of unwanted calls, a call-blocking service can cut out a nice chunk, but you will still receive unwanted calls. 

3) Ask your phone carrier for help: Contact your phone service provider and ask them to block the numbers that keep calling. 

4) Share information: Work together with people you know to gather more ways to prevent unwanted phone calls. At the end of the day, you can help your fellow neighbors by giving them the necessary information that helps them stay safe from identity theft and scams. 

Unwanted phone calls can be an annoyance, but our staff at Provident State Bank is here to help you. Make a visit to your local branch today to learn more about different forms of fraud.