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The second Hackettstown resident to become victim of the scam was a 41-year-old man who received a text message from 1-833-472-0959 claiming to represent Amazon, police said Tuesday.
The man called the number provided in the text (1-833-220-3127) and was told that he needed to purchase gift cards to fix the problem, police said.
The man then purchased $2,000 worth of gift cards from a nearby store and read the numbers to the scammer, police said.
The victim hung up the phone when asked for an additional $2,000, according to police.
The man then received several calls from a number appearing as 206-400-8066, according to police.
“We can’t stress this enough, gift cards are for gifts, not for payments,” said Hackettstown Police. “If someone calls with urgent news or a convincing story and then pressures you to pay them by buying gift cards and then giving them the codes on the back of the card – STOP. It’s a scam.”
Victims of similar phone and email scams should file a complaint at ftc.gov/complaint.
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