Castagneto Carducci: Deceived by a fake buyer on an online platform and induced to carry out an electronic payment transaction. The alleged perpetrator was identified and reported by the Carabinieri

Among the current phenomena that are attracting the most attention, the online scams are the subject of constant counteraction by the Carabinieri of the Provincial Command of Livorno, within the scope of the intensification of the related services according to the guidelines shared by the Provincial Committee for Public Order and Safety at the Prefecture of Livorno.

The action is carried out both with a priority perspective preventive, through constants information meetings held by the Livorno Arma throughout the province, which through a deep repressive action, with investigations aimed at identifying and prosecuting the perpetrators.

In this context, the following have recently intervened: Carabinieri of the Castagneto Carducci Station, who, at the conclusion of an investigation, identified the alleged perpetrator of a scam against a local woman.

La victim had published a Sales announcement of a sofa on a well-known e-commerce site, receiving a response within a short time from a man who, feigning interest in purchasing, had proposed, after some conversations via massage, to pay her the agreed sum, 250 euros, through a few simple operations to be carried out at an ATM, at the end of which she would have received the credit on her prepaid card.

The unsuspecting viewer had agreed and followed the instructions given by the interlocutor over the phone, even typing in codes that, according to the criminal, would have allowed her to collect her fee.

In reality, the woman, through a subtle deception, she had been inadvertently guided to actually make a payment in the form of a top-up.

Realizing that she had been the victim of a scam, the woman tried to call the unknown person back, who, however, had become unreachable in the meantime.

The incident was reported, Carabinieri of Castagneto Carducci they started the investigations, also following the flow of the sum of money, and cross-referencing all the elements collected, they traced the identity of a man in his sixties living in Rome and, given the serious circumstantial evidence against him, they have reported to the Livorno Judicial Authority for the crimes of aggravated fraud, carried out via computer channels and with the use of electronic payment instruments.

How to deal with online scams?

The Carabinieri, in light of yet another scam, call on citizens to pay maximum attention to particular situations in which they are contacted and/or approached by unknown individuals and suspicious behavior, and reiterate that they must also use best practices in relation to the increasingly frequent types of crime arising from links on particularly convenient internet sites and online purchases, behind which, at times, unscrupulous people are hiding, dedicated to scams and deceptions.

During the negotiations It is advisable to use direct communication tools, such as telephone calls, more easily traceable than simple messages via social networks and verify, even via the web, the real presence of companies or retailers.

In case of doubt, you can always contact one of the 27 Carabinieri Stations in the Province of Livorno to express your suspicions and verify any doubts.

The recurrence of different types of scams requires recalling the precautions and measures that the Carabinieri of Livorno recommend in case of doubts and/or lack of knowledge of the interlocutor who approaches you for any type of agreement or request in which the request to carry out an operation or a payment emerges, even if especially by means other than cash, in particular the use of electronic payment instruments.

In this regard, in the above cases, as soon as you have suspicions, the advice is to be extremely careful, not to open the door to strangers who show up at private homes, to be wary of appearances and above all to limit your confidence on the Internet.

In this perspective, therefore, always pay maximum attention, but above all, turn with confidence to the Carabinieri in case of suspicion, by calling 112 NUE to make an immediate report, as well as consult the site Carabinieri.it which illustrates the main types of scams and how to recognize them, since the techniques adopted by scammers, however sneaky and imaginative, have recurring patterns and identifying them is the first step in defending yourself.

In case of receiving calls from landline or mobile numbers with prefixes or numbers compatible with the sender, for example from institutional offices or barracks, since currently frequent phenomena of cloning of numbers already assigned, it is good practice to hang up, then close the suspicious conversation and call the number back in order to confirm that you are not dealing with yet another unknown scammer.