We’ve all probably seen those sketchy-looking phishing emails from scammers. You know the ones that say something like ‘your account has been hacked’ or ‘you’ve got a UPS shipping notification’ or whatever and then it asks you to click on a link. Hopefully, you haven’t fallen for it. Well, the town of Surfside Beach in South Carolina did fall for it recently, sending about half a million dollars to a fraudulent account instead of the Gastonia contractor it was meant for. Reporter Scott Calvert wrote about it for The Wall Street Journal and joined WFAE’s Marshall Terry.
Marshall Terry: The town sent about $545,000 to those fraudsters. What was the money supposed to be for?
Scott Calvert: This was supposed to be the fourth payment to Wildcat Contractors for a project burying overhead power and fiber-optic lines on Ocean Boulevard in Surfside Beach…